Worm: More Than Meets The Eye
by Zero-metallix
Summary: When Primus sees the destruction caused by the Entities he decides to take action before earth can become another victim to their cycle
1. Prologue: Sleeping Giants

He looked at the war torn world, the lives lost and the fallen recycled to continue the destruction it was almost enough to make him despair.

His children had been content once, long ago, but free will was sacred and disagreement was inevitable. He could do nothing to stop what had become an endless cycle of hate played out across time, space and dimensions.

But life continued. With his guidance the world was slowly healing, it would be millennia before any progress would be noticeable but life and his children would return once more.

Until then he cast his attention out into the universe, all of them, looking for the Other or his servants while trying to occlude himself from their attention. Time was immaterial to both of them, they were a constant in all reality. In some they merely slept, gathering energy and in others they battled directly.

It was only by chance he saw the world die, engulfed in flames and the screams of its children.

Worlds died all the time, it was the way of things, but this felt wrong. The natural cycle broken in a way only the Other would wish.

The world had been young and its sun healthy, he looked through the different realities, starting with the nearest, the trail of destruction soon became clear, dead world after dead world and a wound in reality, a void used to move to another world.

He followed the trail from a far off galaxy to a small green and blue world.

That's when he found them, formless creatures drifting through space. They moved from world to world bringing chaos and leaving destruction in their wake, mindlessly repeating the same actions time and again, and gathering knowledge without wisdom.

His gaze again turned to the planet they had reached. He knew the planet well, one of him had passed it once, when it was still just a lifeless rock but now it teamed with life.

The children of the planet were an oddity, constantly poking at things, eternally curious and often getting caught up in events beyond them and yet surviving all the same.

His children often found their way to the small blue planet and their arrival would either brought peaceful coexistence, a golden age for both or his children unwittingly brought disaster, leaving scars that may never heal.

As he continued to watch the entities closed off the space around the world, to keep beings they could not contend with away. Beings like himself.

They were not servants of the Other as he first thought, but they aided his goal. The senseless waste, the constant death of the children grated against all of his aspects.

There were Rules. He could not interfere directly and should he try to send his children they would not be able to reach the world though the barrier the beings had erected.

But maybe there was another, more subtle, solution.

Carefully he reached out, all too aware of his weakened condition and need to remain hidden. A small sliver of itself was extruded, barely more than a thought it could only just be seen as a ribbon of light.

/go/ /watch/ /wait/ /learn/.

Another thought sent it across the galaxy, its small form letting it pass through the barrier unhindered.

The barrier had not been an obstacle but the distance had weakened the Sliver. Being cut off from the whole, it needed to find away sustain itself without causing harm.

Moving directly would burn too much energy so reaching out it felt the minds around it as it allowed itself to be carried on the wind, using only small amounts of energy to keep it near to the children around it.

As it drifted it began to learn, the physical differences between genders, how they thought and acted, how to read the emotions and thoughts that drifted through their minds.

A young man never noticed the tiny ribbon of light, no larger than a hair, land on his bare arm.

The Sliver entered his skin, drawing on the excess energy, careful not to harm him and connecting to his senses. He would never know as it shared his life, his thoughts and emotions as he grew.

To learn about the world, it would sometimes influence him. Nothing overt as free will had to be preserved, but it gave him suggestions or ideas that he heard subconsciously, to leave him free to choose. An idle suggestion to turn left on the way home one day resulted in him meeting a flag wearing ward again and through her he eventually met others.

While he stood there grinning, excited just to meet the local hero's, the Sliver was learning about the parasites they carried and how they worked.

At its encouragement, he kept in touch with some of them over the years.

When his father's boat sunk, claiming everyone on board, the Sliver calmed his dreams and occluded him from a parasite.

It shared Danny's joy when he joined with the woman he loved. It had watched their courtship, stepping in when necessary; he never forgot a date.

During the birth of their child, his overwhelming joy bled back into the Sliver who studied the child down to the genetic level. It traced what came from which parent.

The day they lost Annette it took a more direct hand, forced him to keep going, to focus on the daughter they shared.

They both felt concern when Taylor pulled away, becoming quiet and distant. She barely spoke now and never smiled.

Danny would never notice when the Sliver left him one night.

It watched through Taylor's eyes as her best, and only, friend turned on her. Using knowledge shared in confidence to hurt her and turning her fears against her.

It tried to comfort her as it had Danny. When the nightmares came, it showed her a world of metal shining in the darkness of space and a five faced warrior standing against the dark.

But as they shut the door there was nothing it could do. When she screamed and begged only for them to laugh, it could only watch as it all came to much for her to bear.

The Sliver had watched and it had learned but it was through waiting.


	2. 1-1: First Connection

Putting down my notepad I tried again to bring my mind back towards something vaguely coherent. _Stupid painkillers._

It's been almost a week since the police pulled me out of that locker in the middle of the night and four days since I was sent home from the hospital and I was still drugged up to the eyeballs.

Open cuts on my hands and the 'unsanitary condition of the locker' meant I needed to take a large number of strong antibiotics until the blood tests came back, that was how the hospital had explained it to Dad anyway.

And because telling Dad his daughter was found in a locker full of filth and risked all kinds of illness wasn't enough, I had been kept in for observation because I may have had a heart attack. Apparently the EMT found an irregular heartbeat when they found me.

Shaking my head I tried, again, to focus on what I was drawing, I think it was some kind of face, it was angular and stern but it had been on my mind ever since I woke up in the hospital.

Giving up I glanced at my clock. Dad would be home for lunch soon, I should get something now if I wanted to avoid the awkward silence that dominated our meals now.

I should have told Dad what was going on and looking back it was clear something was wrong, but I didn't want to trouble him. I kept telling myself he had enough problems to deal with between his work and the bills he thought I didn't know about.

Putting my hand on the wall, I made my way slowly downstairs, moving fast at the Moment caused vertigo, not good when on the stairs.

I'd barely spoken to Dad since I got home, part of that was the medication knocking me out for hours at a time, but the rest was me not wanting to see just how much I had hurt him. He probably didn't realise I could hear him this morning.

He had been on the phone, so I don't know if it was the police or the hospital but he wasn't happy. The police hadn't been able to find anything and no one in the school was going to speak up in my defence. That was the other reason I never told him, I knew there was nothing he could do and that would just make him feel worse.

Reaching the kitchen, I sat down to let the dizziness pass when I noticed the papers Dad had left out. Flicking through the bills and paperwork, even I could tell Dad was trying to balance his budget, probably trying to get money together for my hospital stay when the bill arrived.

Before my mind could drift off again I got up and started on a sandwich for lunch, I nearly cut my hand open when something beeped loudly at me. Spinning around I tried to see where the noise came from, but the movement just made my head swim and I clutched the counter until everything settled.

I waited quietly. The house was old and creaky but I knew every noise, every broken step and lose board.

*Beep*

There! Moving slowly, I followed the noise back to the front room, I had to listen for the noise twice more before I heard it from inside my school bag.

The police had found my bag near my locker, apparently It had been sitting there the whole time and no one had touched it. Not that I _had_ anything worth stealing. It went to the hospital with me, then got dumped in the corner of the room when I came home. I hadn't looked at it since.

Carefully, I picked the bag up and moved it to the kitchen. If Emma had put something in my bag, I didn't want to risk it staining the carpet. _With my luck it's a bomb,_ I thought to myself morbidly.

Moving Dad's papers to the counter, I opened the bag and tipped it out onto the table. Books, pens, pencils and a cheap note pad fell out along with an expensive looking smart phone.

I jumped when it beeped again, a battery symbol flashing on its screen. That must have been why it was making noise. Picking it up I turned it over in my hands, I'd never owned a cell phone as Dad hated them; he blamed them for mums death.

"Where did you come from?" I asked the little phone. It had a large glass screen and metal back painted in glossy black. There were no brand markings but on the back was a strange icon; it was a face, painted red with white borders. It almost looked Japanese or from some video game.

Sitting at the table, I tried to work out where it came from. I knew Emma had one but hers was bright pink. While I could see them sticking something in my bag and claiming I'd stole it, I couldn't see them doing that and the locker and the same time.

Maybe they had hoped I wouldn't notice it, wait till I got back then accuse me of theft?

I put the phone on the table and shook my head. I must be out of it, I was being ridiculous and paranoid.

If it had a charge, I could see what was on it and maybe find an owner. Picking the phone up I turned it over in my hands. It was a sealed unit, so I couldn't access the battery compartment, but I found a small USB port on the bottom of the phone.

I didn't notice my hand pulling a pencil and my mostly unused note book out of the mess on the table. Maybe if I took a USB cable, I'm sure there's one around the house somewhere, probably in the basement with Dad's tools, like a wire cutter I could use to strip one end. I'd just need something to work as a connector…maybe..?

Ten minutes later, I realised what I was doing just as I was about to strip the toaster for parts.

The phone was still sitting where I left it on the table and the page from my note book was covered in undecipherable mess. Until I looked at it and realised it was a rough plan to Jury-rig a kettle lead and an old transformer and some other bits and pieces, including stuff from the toaster, into a charging cable.

The fog in my head lifted just long enough for me to recognise the icon on the back of the phone. I ran – stumbled mostly – back upstairs to my room and grabbed my notebook before charging down the stairs. I made it half way down before I fell and slid the rest of the way on my backside, hurting my leg in the fall.

Hobbling into the kitchen, I quickly flicked through to the last page, sure enough sitting there – half finished – was that same face from the back of the phone, around it were… things. A glance at one tells me it's a spark chamber and another is a T-cog. Flipping backwards into my notebook shows other things. Some were just detailed images of parts, others were the finished products and _What on Earth is an 'Ion blaster'!? _

The further back I went the rougher the images became, lines were sloppy and notes almost illegible. Like I'd been in a hurry, or more likely drugged on my medicines from the hospital. I must have been doing this since I got home. Most of them were unfinished, but I could see what needed to be done.

I just needed to find the materials.

Shaking myself, I sat down at the table and tried not to pay too much attention to the designs. My heart was pounding and I needed to calm down. The hospital warned me not to overdo it.

*TSCHE-CHU-CHU-CHU-TSCHE*

The universe apparently hadn't got that memo. Looking down I saw the phone collapse in on itself, the screen split open while other parts rotated and folded in on itself like some kind of complex puzzle as arms and legs became identifiable.

It took a couple of seconds for the phone to transform into a little robot. Parts of the phone were still recognisable. The touch screen clearly made up the majority of its chest and shoulders. One of the phones cameras was attached to the side of its helmet.

Its five fingered hands were tiny and the robot itself couldn't be more than five inches tall. its big blue visor looked up at me. *Beep?* it questioned.

That's when I passed out.

"Taylor?! Taylor!" I was shaken awake by Dad and it took me a moment to realise what he was panicking about. I was on the kitchen floor; he must have come home for lunch and found me out cold.

"Dad, it's alright, I'm fine, I… just got a bit worked up."

I didn't like lying to him, but it seemed to have become second nature to me. Besides, as he helped me up I could see the normal looking phone sitting on the table where I left it amongst Dad's paperwork. It was switched on with a full battery. For all I knew I'd blacked out from the medication and dreamt the whole thing.

"Are you sure you're okay?"

"Yeah, Dad I'm fine, just those stupid pills." I sat back at the table while Dad started to clear up, I had almost convinced myself I'd dreamt the whole thing when Dad stopped to look at what he was clearing up.

"Taylor" He asked as he looked at something with a puzzled expression "What is this?"

I looked at the page full of designs and felt my stomach drop.

I stared at the table as part of me felt guilty that I'd tried to hide what happened, while the rest still hoped it was all a dream. "I… I don't know, I think... I think I've been getting these ideas ever since…. since the hospital, but I've been too out of it to realise.

Before Dad could ask anything else, the phone decided now was a perfect time to make itself known and transformed again. The look on Dads face was actually quite comical.

Dad stared in shock as the little bot waved happily at him before turning back to me. *Beep?*

I took a deep breath. I was much calmer and I was not going to pass out this time.

"Taylor… what… was… is?" Dad was struggling and the little robot looked between us before shrugging and launching into a long explanation of beeps, clicks and squeaks as it points at me and gesturing wildly with its arms as it chattered away like a happy songbird.

I couldn't stop myself from giggling which made him puff his chest out proudly.

It was quite expressive for a faceplate and visor.

At Dad's questioning look I elaborated aloud with, "He's complaining about being left in my bag for so long that his battery was getting low."

Dad sunk into an empty chair "You can… understand it? How?"

I gave the bot a questioning look and he started to point at the paper on the table around him then back at himself.

"I.. I think I made him" With a sense of finality it all clicked into place. "I _made_ him!" I had powers, I'm a cape!


	3. 1-2: Second Connection

Finding out out I had powers was one thing, working out what they were and how to use them was another. It didn't help that the medication was still knocking me out for hours; one of the pills I had to take in the morning would leave me useless till almost lunch time.

I Looked back through my drawing pad, god knows how out of it I must have been not to notice what I had been drawing. Grumbling to myself about stupid, cross-reacting, medication I turned back to the 'shopping list' I was making.

I spent hours after Dad went back to work yesterday going through my designs, adding details and fleshing out ideas while looking for anything I could build with what we hand in the house, apparently there wasn't.

I was in the basement where Dad had fitted a workbench and wall mounted tool shelf. Dad had always been good at fixing things and I used to like to help when I was little. Mostly it was a collection of screwdrivers and a soldering iron.

He hadn't used it in years so, I was going to use it as my own workshop for now. The problem was anything I had designed so far would need specialist tools that would either cost a fortune to buy or I would have to build from scratch, which required even more tools.

My... 'phone?' was trying to tidy up the workbench beside me. Currently he was trying to lift a hammer that was bigger than he was and certainly heaver.

Giving up, he made a huffing gesture complete with with a frustrated growling noise. It was kind of adorable to be honest. He grabbed the handle again and tried to drag the hammer across the desk towards the tools on the wall.

His problem solving and emotive abilities were incredible.

"Hey, Kiddo," Dad called from the top of the stairs, "Ready to go?"

"Yea, just let me grab my phone. He's just tidying up" I ignored Dad's bemused look and went to grab the little bot, as soon as my hand closed around him he transformed.

It was Sunday and after nearly a week of confinement, I was ready to climb the walls. The doctors had said I could stop taking some of the medications, which thankfully included whatever one it was that had been knocking me out. I certainly felt clear headed for the first time since I woke up in hospital.

Dad was taking me down to the board walk to get some fresh air and to look through some of the thrift stores for anything I could use. The shopping list I had been working on had a list of 'would be nice' items that I could really use. Mostly it was stuff for my phone.

Walking outside, I idly walked over to the old pick-up Dad still drove. It was older than me, but dad would often remind me that it still ran better than any other car on the block.

Opening the car door, I could see what he meant as body was older than me but the engine was fairly new. Dad must have swapped it out sometime, which explained the reinforcements on the engine mounts, though there was some rust on the exhaust that was going to cause some problems soon. But I could fix that and it looked like someone had keyed the side recently, that had to go, Huh now that I looked at it there was a large dent in the drivers door that could be fixed-

Ideas took shape in my mind. Things I could do to make the truck better, like armour plating or a self driving system. I could almost see what I would need to make it work and how it would all fit together and a new fuel that would be highly efficient with zero emissions. If I could just find the right elements.

Something was building in my chest, a warmth that was slowly spreading through my body. With a gasp, I let go of the door and quickly stepped back from the truck. The information slowly faded from my mind.

"Taylor?! are you okay, what happened?" Dad was quickly by my side.

"I... I'm okay, I think... I think I just worked out something about my-" I trailed off as I didn't want to say it out loud where the neighbours could hear me. I probably looked strange enough as it was and I could feel myself trembling. Shaking my head, I climbed into the truck, this time ignoring the information that filtered in and stared at my shaking hands.

As soon as Dad climbed in, I told him what had happened. He took one my hands and held it till I stopped shaking. "Do you want to go back into the house?" he asked softly.

I shook my head. "No, if I spend any more time indoors I'm going to start talking to the furniture."

He chuckled and then he said, "You used to do that when you were little."

The drive gave me time to think. My power was apparently telling me everything about the truck, but it was getting easier to ignore it. Reaching into my pocket, I pulled out my phone. "I don't suppose you have any answers?"

The number 42 came up on the screen. "Smart ass," I grumbled back playfully.

It took me a moment to realise my power was feeding me information on my phone just like it was with the truck. But it also included information on how it transformed and what it would look like in both forms.

The interlocking pieces were fascinating and the seams that were all but invisible stood out clearly now.

But what really drew my attention the most was the glowing sphere. In robot mode it sat in the chest and was directly connected to two more components, both were tiny, but my power was telling me they were important.

I recognised them from my earliest drawings. They were the Spark Chamber (the blue glow was the spark itself), Processor and the Transformation Cog.

Information filled my head. The properties of a spark, the effect it had on the frame it was placed in and how it determined the final size of the robot. More than that, I could feel it, it was connected to me and through that connection I could feel... curiosity, affection... family.

That's when I realised what I was really holding. It wasn't just a small robot, it was a living thing that I had created somehow. A small being and made of metal and wires, but _alive_.

"You okay there, kiddo?"

Dad's voice made me jump, I must have spaced out again as we were already at the boardwalk.

"Sorry I was thinking." I gestured at my phone. "He really needs a name."

Despite mid winter, it was a bright clear, though still chilly, day. The boardwalk overlooked the bay, giving a great view of the Protectorate's base sitting out in the bay.

The gangs treated it as a sort of neutral ground, there were no tags on the walls and nobody started trouble.

This was mostly because the shops had pooled their money and hired a private security firm to keep the gangs out. They were informally known as the Enforcers. Dad didn't like them much.

There was some trouble awhile back between a couple of Enforcers and some of the dock workers. One of Dad's friends had ended up spending the night in hospital while the Enforcer who caused it was let go due to 'lack of evidence'.

Even with the winter sales, it wasn't too busy so Dad and I could take out time. I needed some new clothes, as the locker had destroyed one of my favourite pairs of jeans.

I had expected crowds when we came out. What I hadn't expected was my power running off on tangents from the slightest thing. Random things sights like a little boy with a toy dinosaur left me with an idea for a full sized one, made of metal with a robot mode that carried a massive sword.

_My power was weird. _

As I was mentally going over what I would possibly need to build such a thing, Dad called out to me, breaking my train of thought and making me blush. I had been standing there staring at nothing again.

In the end, I resorted to picking up a small notebook and pen to scribble ideas on while we had lunch.

I think Dad wanted to talk while we ate as he kept either glancing at my notebook or me. I don't think he knew where to start... to be honest neither did I.

After lunch, we stopped by an electronics store, because I wanted a wall charger and a couple of USB leads that would fit my phone – _I really need to name him later_ – his batteries had been full ever since I found him – Something else I need to look into – but they would be useful if I built more.

Out of morbid curiosity, I went over to the PC section to see what ideas I could pick up. Even with the sales, we couldn't afford a new computer. But maybe I could build something.

As soon as I touched one, it mapped itself out in my mind. I had to stop myself from frowning. It was too low powered to do anything more than word processing. The power supply and motherboard were very low end and wouldn't be able to support upgrades. That was if they didn't burn out within the next six months.

Shaking my head, I moved on to more expensive units. They all had the same problems; cheap parts and underpowered. I could patch a couple of the more expensive ones together and run them in parallel. Three or four computers with one dedicated to graphics processing might be powerful enough, but that would need a custom operating system. None of the off the shelf ones would support a home built supercomputer, but if I was going to go that far I might as well just-

Dad's hand landed on my shoulder, bringing me out of my latest daze. "You okay, kiddo?"

Thankfully no one had noticed me this time. I really needed to be more careful or I was going to out myself as a cape. "Yea fine, its just a lot to take in." I smiled weakly "I think I'm getting a bit of a headache."

"Alright, do you want to head home? We can grab some takeaway and a movie if there's nothing else you want here."

We made our way back to the truck. On the ride home, I quizzed my phone on possible names that he might like.


	4. 1-3: Third Connection

I slept late on Monday. Between the medication and the day out yesterday, I was exhausted.

I wasn't going back to school any time soon, at the very least not until the police investigation was completed.

Shuffling around the kitchen, listening to the old radio on the counter I decided I should try and find out what my power could really do, instead of constantly being caught off guard.

Sitting at the table with the notebook I brought yesterday, I made a list of everything I knew while Rewind – that was the name my phone had chosen – would look things up for me on the Internet.

That was the plan anyway. Once I had Rewind in one hand and a notepad in the other, I got a little distracted making notes about him.

I still didn't know where he came from, only that my power was involved. His contact list was empty so no help there, so I decided to look through the photos.

Flicking through the photos stored on his memory it quickly became clear he had taken a liking to recording everything he saw.

"Rewind, can you show me the photos from before I found you?"

The little bot chirped happily, before he scrolled through countless images to bring me to the 'starting point and I brought up the first image. It was a picture of me, taken when I first found him, I picked another image at random.

I was very nearly sick. "OH GOD! DELETE! DELETE!" Looking away, I held Rewind at arms length while trying not to get any of... that on me. Puzzled by my actions the little bot did as I asked. Apparently he didn't understand the term _'explicit content'_ or _'filter'_.

Ugh. I wish I could build something to get those images out of my head.

Moving carefully through the remaining images, I came to two conclusions: 1, Rewinds previous owner was a freak and 2, they had been one of Emma's interchangeable followers.

I wonder if she even knew or cared her phone was missing?

Rewind himself wasn't much help, his first memory was waking up in a locker. He had taken a series of photos that documented his great escape, helped by his running commentary. There were some rather good close-ups of rats and spiders.

When he woke, Rewind had immediately transformed and set to work escaping. There had been a hole in the back of the locker, which the owner had used to hide things in. It lead to a crawl space between the walls that he followed till he reached a small air vent. From there he had made his way back to my locker.

My bag had been beside my locker, so he must have climbed in after calling for help

Most of this was guess work based on what he was telling me combined with the photos he had taken. I could barely remember what happened after they shoved me in there and Rewind claimed to have no memory of what created him.

Mentally shaking myself, I tried to get back on task. It didn't matter how or where Rewind came from, he got me out of that locker. Right now that's all I care about.

Putting all that to one side, I focused on Rewind's physical condition. Whatever had created him had also upgraded him.

He was connecting himself to the nearest cell network in range and I don't think anyone had a faster net connection than him. He also didn't seem to worry about data limits. If he was still a normal phone he would have filled his memory twice over with music by now. Just where he was downloading the music from was another matter entirely.

I knew most of this was probably illegal, I just couldn't bring myself to care.

Most of this came from my power when he sat in my hand. When I had suggested opening him up for a better look he had grabbed a fork and tried to defend himself with it. I was joking... mostly.

By lunchtime, I was fairly sure I knew what my powers were. I'm a Tinker, a type of para-human who could build advanced technology 'Para-humans Online' had thread after thread on them along with countless theories on where their ideas came from.

Aside from a few very rare exceptions, no two para-humans had the same powers. Though some could have similarities. All tinkers built stuff, for example, but there was always a unique twist. All tinkers had a specialisation and from the looks of things mine was robotics.

One thing I couldn't find was any information on was this weird touch power I had. Strictly speaking it was classed as a 'striker' power but I couldn't find any information on a comparable power.

Trying to find my limits, I got up and went into the front room. I must have looked silly walking round the house touching everything but soon I had an idea what worked. The TV and my old computer both responded, but the keyboard and mouse when disconnected did not. Nor did the TV remote.

So it only worked on things that were 'advanced' enough or directly connected to something that my power could work with.

What's more, each time I found something my power could work with I would feel a warmth in my chest.

When I came back into the kitchen, the radio was losing signal again. It was old and had been dropped years ago, Dad fixed it but it never been the same since.

Putting my hand on the radio, I closed my eyes and felt my power map itself the radio out in my mind. Holding the flow of information back, I tried to focus on what was wrong.

Even with my eyes closed I could see the problem. When it was first broken some parts were knocked loose. Dad fixed most of them, but one had developed a fault that caused problems when it got hot.

Ignoring the radio for the moment, I closed my eyes and concentrated on the warmth. It wasn't painful, just a gentle heat that was slowing spreading across my body. It was like being in a hot bath.

I could feel it trying to reach the radio. Curious, I tried to mentally 'push' the heat into the radio. I gasped as the broken parts rebuilt themselves and the scratches and nicks on the case filled in.

I let go out of shock, breaking the connection while I stared at the radio. It looked brand new and sounded better than ever.

Backing up, I sat down at the table. "Beep?" Rewind was watching me nervously. I put my hand on the table and he gently patted the back of my hand, trying to calm me down.

I could feel the warmth fading and I was shaking again. Actually now I realised it, I was also breathing harder. I felt like I'd just run up and down the stairs a couple of time.

A strong cup of tea later and I added to my notes that I can fix things.

Is that why Rewind never needed charging? Was I charging him every-time I picked him up?

I had let go before the warmth could do more than repair the radio. What would happen if I kept pushing?

Their were a couple of boxes of junk under the basement stairs. Maybe I could find something useful in one?

Digging through the boxes had mostly been a waste of time. The only thing I had found that I could work with was an old VCR.

Pulling the final box open, I found an old 1/6 scale model of a sports car. One of Dad's friends had got it for him as some private joke from work that I was 'too young to understand'.

The car was white with green and red racing decals and red wheels. The plaque on the side of its stand said Lancia. It looked cool but it was just a lump of plastic, my power couldn't do anything with it.

Taking it over to my workbench, I unbolted the car from the stand and started trying to get the body off. Hopefully I could use the shell. There was room enough inside it for me to fit an electric motor and some batteries and if I removed the model engine I might be able to...

Grabbing some paper, I started making some designs white dictating a shopping list to Rewind

I spent most of the afternoon working on what I could do with the car until I had to make a start on dinner.

Rewind had been looking prices online for the different parts I needed to hopefully make the model into something I could work with. As dinner cooked, I looked through his results I felt my stomach fall.

There was no way I could afford most of this.

I could cut some corners here and there, build some parts myself from scratch, but to do that I would need tools I cant afford.

Maybe I could sell some of my designs? I just didn't know who would be interested in designs for a robot that turns into a miniature car that they couldn't build... Maybe I could try and work on commission?

Of course, I didn't have a clue how to go about setting any of that up.

Letting my mind wonder, my eyes fell on the repaired radio and an idea slowly began to form. It wouldn't solve everything, but it would be enough to get me started.

Grabbing Rewind, who squawked and beeped at me, I quickly called Dad.

"Hey Dad," I said in greeting.

I could hear the surprise in his voice, it had been along time since I called him at work. "you okay, Kiddo?"

"Yea, I'm fine. Actually, I just had an idea that I need your help with. Can you stop by the junkyard on your way home?"

"I think so, why?"

This was going to be the hard part. "I need a couple of TV's. Plasma or LCD would be best, it doesn't matter if they are broken."

"Taylor... are you sure? That sort of thing isn't cheap"

"I know, it's okay. Trust me, if this works you will get your money back."

He sighed. "Alright, Taylor, I'll see what I can do. But you're going to explain this when I get home."

"Okay! Thanks! Bye!"

If that worked we should have a bit of extra money. _And if it doesn't Dad is going to be really mad. _

I was just finishing up dinner when Dad got home. He put the TV's in the front room while we ate.

"Okay Kiddo, what was all this about?"

I shrugged "I was messing with my powers earlier when I found I could do this!" I walked over to the least damaged TV as I spoke.

Dad had brought two flat screens, both were about twice the size of our current TV and one of them had clearly been smashed.

Putting my hand on the TV that was in better condition, my power mapped it out and I started to push my power into it. Most of the damage had been internal but it had picked up some cosmetic damage while at the yard.

I heard Dad gasp as the TV repaired itself.

Taking a step back I sat down on the sofa, that had been more draining than fixing the radio. "See? I can use my power to fix things. We could sell this for what? Twice what you paid for them?"

"Probably not, pawn shops are cheap," Dad muttered while examining the now repaired TV. He turned back to me. "You okay?"

I nodded. "Yea, just trying to catch my breath."

Having caught my breath, I immediately walked over to the other TV. My power told me that it was in a much worse state, as if that was not obvious. The screen was smashed and and someone had torn parts of the casing off. there was also some missing parts on the main board.

I wasn't sure how my power would handle the missing components, so this would make a good test.

As I pushed my power into the TV, I was able to see the broken parts repair themselves. But what really drew my attention were the missing parts. Replacements folded or grew out of the surrounding pieces.

My heart was hammering in my chest by the time I let go and stumbled to the ground. "Taylor!" Dad was there immediately to help me up. I felt like I had just ran a marathon.

"I'm okay! That was just more tiring than I thought it would be"

"Taylor, I know your excited by all this but you need to be careful. What if I hadn't been here? You've already had... I can't..." He didn't say it but I knew what he meant. I'd already had one heart attack.

By the time I had calmed Dad down, I was starting to feel better but I had to promise to be more careful in the future.

Checking the TV told me that I had increased its mass.

It looked like I could ignore missing components and my power would create them directly but the mass cost me.


	5. 1-4 Forth Connection

Dad took both the repaired TVs with him to work the next day. He was going to sell that a pawn shop during his lunch.

He had been a bit quiet this morning as I think the incident with my powers bothered him. I think watching me collapse like that had scared him. _And once again I end up hurting Dad._

Booting up my old computer, ignoring the ways I could make it better, I started to browse PHO.

Rewind may have had a faster net connection, but his small screen would give me a headache if I spent too long on it. He was currently sunbathing nearby, having found a sunny spot and sprawled out in it. I think he used the time to web browse or edit videos.

I felt like I was stuck in a loop. I had plenty of ideas, but I needed tools to make them, I needed money to get the materials I needed to build those tools but I couldn't get that money without building something.

By this point I had a list of tools I wanted to build. At the top was a computer that was powerful enough for CAD software and could be used for programming. If it was really powerful, I could include a holographic interface. _Dream on, Taylor. Dream on._

I still needed to find out what would happen if I kept pushing, though I was beginning to suspect what would happen. I hadn't tried it with the TVs, as I couldn't risk my power doing anything weird with them.

It didn't help that my search through PHO for an explanation about last night had brought me to a thread that talked about what happened when para-humans that overexerted themselves.

Headaches, migraines and nausea were common results of overuse. There was even one story of a cape who killed himself, though that story wasn't confirmed.

Flicking back to the tinker threads, I tried to find a solution to my supply problem.

After nearly two hours of searching, I had come to one simple conclusion. _I am so screwed!_

There were almost no independent tinkers around. They either worked for the PRT, the gangs or Toybox.

There were three major gangs in brockton bay: The merchants, the brain fried druggies; Empire Eighty Eight, the Neo-Nazi white supremacists; and the Asian Bad Boyz, a pan Asian gang lead by a man who turned into a dragon.

All three openly recruited from Winslow and their members were easy to spot.

So of the gangs only the Empire and the Merchants were options. _Not happening!_

The only hero groups still active in BB were New Wave, a team that did not bother with secret identities. They publicly unmasked themselves, becoming minor celebrities in the process. The healer Panacea was probably the most well known of them.

I couldn't find much about Toybox on PHO, but it was apparently an organisation for tinkers that sold everything they built to whoever could meet their prices.

That just left the protectorate, the nation wide government funded team. To be more exact, the Wards, the junior team for para-humans under eighteen years old.

Reading between the lines, it didn't need to be said what happened to tinkers who tried to go independent.

The gangs were out as there was no chance I would work with any of them.

That just left the Wards or New Wave.

If I joined New Wave would I have to 'out' myself? That would put dad at risk and I wasn't sure I could live with that. The Wards would just be more teenage drama and after what happened at school I wasn't sure I wanted to deal with that again.

Then there was the problem of my specialisation, if I could do what I think I could then the teen drama was the least of my worries. The PRT wasn't fond of anything that could self replicate.

Putting aside scale, I'm sure if I gave Rewind the right tools and materials he could follow one of my designs to build more bots.

I shut my computer down and grabbed some money and Rewind, who let out a squawk of surprise. I needed to go out. I left dad and note and got the bus back to the Boardwalk.

It would be awhile before I could do anything with that car model, but that didn't mean I couldn't look for alternatives.

There were three different electronic stores in the Boardwalk. A branch from a major chain store that sold TVs, DVD players and those useless pre-built PCs. A small hobby store that sold models and remote control toys and small store that sold electronic parts. Like the kind people who built everything themselves needed.

The electronics store was a bust, there was almost nothing I could afford and what bits I could were not worth the effort, so I moved on. I did however pick up an idea that I would need to look into later. It was about converting a printer into something that could print custom circuit boards on plastic sheets.

Walking into the hobby store, I was almost immediately approached by one of the salesmen.

"Hi, is there anything I can help you with?" I tried not to grimace, he looked a bit older than me and was dressed in the stores blue uniform shirt and black trousers. "Oh, um I'm fine thanks." He gave me a look, not even trying to be subtle, glancing at my worn jeans and slightly faded hoodie before walking off.

"A..actually! I'm um looking for a present for my dad, its his birthday soon." _Okay…Note to self: learn how to lie better. _

He gave me another look as if trying to guess what I could afford. Then he smiled and lead me back towards the RC Cars.

I spent almost five minutes listening to him as he talked about signal ranges, channels and battery life all the while I tried to subtly touch them, before making an excuse to leave.

Most of the cars did respond to my power but cost too much. There was a build it yourself kit that would have fit inside the Lancia shell with just a little work, but it was nearly $200.

It was as I was leaving when I spotted something in the clearance section.

_I remember that!_

It was a toy robot. It was circular, about the size and shape of a dinner plate, but nearly two inches thick with its wheels hidden beneath it. On top was a set of buttons, four directional and nine numeric that let you program directions into the little robot.

We had one in my elementary school. The teachers stuck a set of mouse ears and a tail to it. We called it the turtle. _God we were silly._

I spent nearly an hour carefully programming a route around the classroom once. I couldn't help but smile at the memory.

Walking over I touched it and immediately felt my power map it out along with any improvements I could make. The toy was simple enough I could use my current computer to program it.

A glance at their "parts section" that consisted of three shelves of mostly of pre-built boards and wires told me I would spend more time stripping down and re-purposing than was worth the effort.

Picking the robot up, I quickly paid for it and a cheap radio from the clearance section before making my way to the other end of the Boardwalk where the hobbyist store was.

The building was smaller than the electronic store and it was privately owned, half the shelves were lined with plastic trays that were filled with different resistors, integrated circuits and so on. The rest of the shelves were full of different wiring and cases.

It was the first time I had been here since I got my powers. Dad brought me in here a couple of times when he needed something. Just walking through the doors took my breath away as my power went crazy.

_If I took some of those capacitors and wired them correctly using that cabling and a few other things I could build a power storage unit that could be integrated into half a dozen weapon systems. Enough of those fans could make a cooling unit for it or if that pump was water rated I could use it to run a water cooling system._

Taking a deep breath I pushed the information aside. How did other tinkers deal with this?

Once I had my power under control, I focused on the improvements I wanted for the little robot in my bag. Circuit boards, some microchips, better motors and a couple of LED's that could be combined with a LDD to make a crude collision detection system. A wireless networking card could be re-purposed into giving it a net connection like Rewind...

The guy at the counter didn't even blink at the odd assortment of parts as I added more stuff to my collection.

By the time I had finished and was on the bus home I had nearly wiped out my savings. _I hope Dad got a good price for those TVs._

Back home, I took my purchases and Rewind down to my workshop before going back up to the kitchen and making myself a cup of tea.

Tea in hand, I made my way back to the basement.

Rewind was already clearing the Lancia model away and was making space on the work bench for me. _Leave him alone for five minutes and he starts trying to tidy up._

The first thing I did was put the toy I had just bought on the workbench and start removing the plastic casing. Rewind stood to one side, a little red light on the side of his head let me know he was recording this.

At some point he started to play music.

"Taylor, are you home?" Dad's voice made me jump, he was home early today.

"I'm down here!" I called back.

Finishing what I was doing, I picked up rewind and headed upstairs. It was only then I realised just how tired I felt, my head was pounding and I was a bit dizzy.

Dad took one look at me before quickly moving to catch my arm. "Taylor! what have you been doing?"

I shook my head in an effort to clear it. "I've been working. I had a couple of ideas I wanted to try."

"Did you at least open the window?"

I groaned and put my face in my hands. Thankfully I had been using lead-free solder, but a glance at the clock showed I had been working without a break since I got home. My second cup of tea was still sitting on the side and stone cold by now. _When did I make that?_

I sat at the table while Dad made a start on a quick and simple dinner for us. He was telling me about his day, but I wasn't really listening.

"So what were you working on so intently you forgot to eat?" Some amusement had crept back into Dad's voice, he must have noticed my attention was elsewhere.

Rather than try to explain I took Dad down into the basement and showed him the mess of wires parts. In the middle of it all was the toy robot. I had just finished putting the case back on before he got home.

I shrugged at Dad's amused look at the car model that was still in pieces.

"That's a work in progress. This is what I was doing today. I bought it earlier and I've upgraded the motors..." Dad listen to me with the same bemused expression he gave me when he asked me 'what I was doing with his power tools' when I was six.

It took me a minute to realise he probably didn't want or need to know every little thing I had done to the toy, so I decided to skip to the 'why'.

"I know there's more to my power than just fixing things, but I need something to try it out on." I smirked at him. "Unless you want me to try it out on the TV?"

Dad chuckled at that. "No! I'd rather you not blow up the TV. But are you sure this is safe?" Concern was starting to creep into his voice.

"Yea, I think I know what happened last night. I'll be fine."

Putting my hands on the modified toy, I felt the now familiar pop as it mapped itself out in my mind and the warmth building in my body.

I stayed like that for a minute until it became clear that the warmth and the pressure weren't going to get any worse. Then I pushed the energy into the toy.

Outwardly nothing happened at first, but I could see the changes start. The plastic case strengthened and some of the stuff I had added realigned itself to work better.

I frowned when nothing else happened. There had to be something more to this ability. I could feel it.

Taking a deep breath, I reached for my power and pushed harder. I pushed as much energy as I could into it.

*TSCHE-CHU-CHU-CHU-TSCHE*

I jumped back in shock at the sound just in time to see the "toy" collapse in on itself, transforming into a spindly robot.

He was nearly twice the height of Rewind with an orange and white colour scheme and rather than a visor and faceplate, he had a narrow face with what looked like glasses and large eyebrows.

He looked around curiously before giving me a nervous smile and a wave.

I took a deep breath to steady myself. I didn't feel as bad as last night, more like I had been running up and down the stairs. Maybe it would help if I exercised more?

I turned to Dad who had gone white. "So Dad, what should I call him?"

Dad was quiet as we left Rewind talking to my newest bot as we went back up stairs.

Dinner was tense. I did my best to ignore it and asked Dad about his day in an attempt to break the silence. This had probably been the longest conversation I'd had with dad in a long time.

Dad probably knew what I was trying to do but went along with it anyway.

Gradually the tension eased. "Oh, I took those TVs to the pawn shop near my office at lunch. The guy was surprised to see me getting rid of them. Given the neighbourhood, he didn't ask any questions but he haggled a bit over price. Luckily your old man knows what he's doing."

He passed me a roll of bills. It was almost double what dad had paid for the TVs._ I am so going back for that RC kit. _

"You planning on making a habit out of this kiddo? You could make a living as the worlds best TV repair woman," he chuckled.

"Oh god, no!" I laughed as him, It felt good to be able to share a joke with my Dad again. "I want to be a hero." _Fuck!_

Dad sobered up instantly. The concern was clear on his face. "Taylor, are you sure about that? I lost two more guys to the gangs this week, one got caught in the cross fire and the other has joined the Empire."

I knew how much losing people hurt Dad as he took his job at the dock workers union seriously.

"Dad... I know its dangerous, but I can't just do nothing. The things I can build could really help people, I just need time to figure out how. To find something that could work"

"What about the Protectorate or the Wards, have you considered them?"

I nodded. "I did, but it just sounds like school with powers. I don't want to deal with that. Not after... For now I want to see how far I can get on my own."

"Alright. I know I cant change your mind, your as stubborn as your mother, just be careful, for my sake if nothing else." Dad sighed and I couldn't stop the flash of guilt.

"I... It's not like I'm just going to rush out and start fighting gang members. I barely understand my powers," I told him. "I don't even have a costume" I laughed at that. It was a little weak, but it got a smile from Dad. "I don't know how long its going to be before I can build anything I can use in a fight. Probably months."

Dad sat quietly, thinking over what I said. "Taylor..." He shifted uncomfortably. "I... have a friend that works for the PRT...I called her earlier."

My heart froze. _He didn't! He couldn't!_

"I trust her to be discreet, she strongly suggested you join the wards. She offered to organise an appointment with them later in the week. You can meet her and maybe she can help you with you're powers."

"You told the PRT about me!?" I couldn't keep the anger out of my voice. I couldn't believe it, I thought things were starting to get better between us.

"You just about collapse every-time you use you're powers! And now your talking about going out and getting into fights?"

I jumped to my feet. "I'm fine! I just need to fine my limits" I shouted back. _He can't do this!_

"Taylor, you don't even know _why_ you are passing out. You could be _dying!_."

That was when I realized he was not angry, he was terrified. I sat down, guilt drowning my temper.

"Six months," he said, his voice softening. "She told me that's how long independents last. often less in this city. They are either killed, arrested or forced into the gangs."

We sat quietly, lost in our own thoughts at _that _bit of information.

I tried to look at it from Dads point of view. Every time he had seen me use my powers I had been pushing them, trying to find my limits. After everything else it must have been horrible for him.

"I... I will be more careful. I just don't want to go to the PRT. I just don't know how they will react."

Dad sighed. "Okay, what if I ask her to come here? Meet you 'off the record'. She's an old friend and won't say any anything unless you ask her to."

I didn't really have any choice as it wasn't like I could hide what I was doing from him.

Nodding in agreement, I got up and made my way up stairs to my room. Rewind and my newest bot made there own way up a little later.

Authors note: I just want people to know. i DO read your reviews even if i dont reply. It's usualy because I'm worried im going to spoil something.


	6. 1-5 Fith Connection

*Taylor, Please. This isn't healthy.* I ignored my new bot, Rung and focused on how I was going to make the power linkage work.

It was Saturday and I was in my room working on my designs. Dad was downstairs. He had been on the phone with someone for awhile now. Occasionally, I would hear him shout angrily. Something must have gone wrong at work.

*You can't ignore what happened.* He wasn't quite pleading. His well meaning attempts to help had been sweet when he first started, but after almost a week I was just about ready to... I held back a sigh. I couldn't threaten him. Both my little bots knew I would never bring myself to hurt them.

*You need to face it and the first step is to talk about it. If not to me then at least your father.*

Dad and I hadn't spoken much since he dropped the bombshell. I wasn't exactly trying to avoid him, but I didn't want to finish our conversation either. I don't know if he'd spoken to his friend or not, but he hadn't mention it when we saw each other.

"I'm fine," I snapped out.

Nodding in understand, Rung climbed off my bedside table and made his way across the room.

And now I felt guilty for snapping at him.

I had spent most of my time since Rung's creation either ignoring him, coming up with theories about Rewind or trying to design a set of armour for myself.

A basic set of power armour was surprisingly easy to design. The face symbol I had been seeing since getting my powers would make a great mask. It just needed some tweaking. Something to make it more 'mine'. The rest wasn't too far removed from one of my bots. It just had to be scaled up, hollowed out and given much stronger armour plating. _Maybe a boron Alloy?_

Building it would be another matter entirely. Alloys for armour would have to be custom made and shaped with tools I didn't have or wasn't even sure existed. The base frame would need to be carefully assembled to fit me while still leaving room for growth.

I also needed a non-lethal weapon that could be used against people while still being useful against capes. Not to mention dealing with brutes. That wasn't so easy. My power came with a lot of different weapon designs, but unfortunately they were mostly of the 'punch holes in mountains' level of destructive and had truly staggering energy requirements.

My best design so far was the 'Null Ray'. A rifle-like weapon that could disable electronics. I was trying to find a way to make it work on people, so on low power it would cause numbness and hopefully knock most normal people out. At higher power it should even be able to deal with mid to low power brutes.

Or it would reduce them to a smoking crater, I wasn't quite sure. Which might be a problem. It would, of course, be easier if I could build some sort of prototype or had a computer capable of simulating the end result. Mentally, I moved 'build a computer' closer to the top of my to-do list.

I hadn't made much headway on the car models design either. I wanted to hold off buying the parts for a couple of days. Looking back on it, I hadn't done the best job keeping my identity secret. Rushing out and buying junk or standing in public making notes were kind of noticeable. PHO had a thread dedicated to some of the stupid ways different capes had outed themselves.

Some of them were funny. _Like that blaster who ended up fighting in the nude._ But I didn't want to be one of them. _If Dad hasn't done it for me._

Putting my upcoming meeting aside, I focused on my main problem.

Supplies. In our last brief discussion, Dad had agreed to pick up some more stuff for me to fix. In theory I could slowly build up money that way. Small profits over a long period of time. That would be painfully slow however as Dad would have to use a different pawn shop each time. But even if I had money, I would still need some way to get the materials I needed.

The best I could think of was to buy stuff online and have it shipped to a commercial PO box at the docks. Dad and I could then pick them up later. Of course, that idea wasn't without its problems. The docks were ABB territory. And 'interesting' things going through there might be reported to the gang leader.

A box at the closest US Post Office would be better, but those cost more. Also the post office would be more suspicious of random packages. The advent of capes had forced a whole new list of rules.

On my desk Rewind beeped at Rung. Rewind was on my desk, with a mirror propped up against the wall. He was sitting very still while Rung helped paint his faceplate with some old model paints and some fine brushes I had found.

The brushes had been too long for either of them to really use, so Rewind had snapped the shaft close to the bristles to make things easier. Rung had collected the broken shaft and made a start on building a small model with the splinters.

It was surprising how different they were. Rewind was a curious thing, always running around trying to record everything he saw. Rung however tended to sit quietly and just watch. He didn't talk much but despite being the newer of the two bots he 'felt' older. He also didn't transform much. _Maybe I should change his alt-mode?_

While Rewind spent his time on PHO or video sites, Rung spent most of it reading psychiatry texts online. _He's also surprisingly good with a paint brush_, I noticed as he carefully traced some details on Rewinds face.

Much to my annoyance, Rung kept bringing up the locker. Honestly, I was fine. Now that I was finally off the medication, I could really work on my designs. Okay, I was starting to have nightmares but that was normal. _I think._

A beep from Rewind as he directed Rung brought me back to another issue I was having. I'm not sure why they couldn't 'speak' normal English. They were certainly smart enough and Rewind had shown the ability to play back recordings of things he heard, including peoples voices. And they understood it fine.

The pair of them did seem to have a language of their own. It was made up of beeps, clicks and other electronic sounds. Rung even revved his electric motors when he got frustrated. I'd watch the two of them 'talk' to each other for nearly an hour once.

It might have been a hardware limit, both had very simple vocal systems and there wasn't enough room inside there frames for anything more sophisticated. Or maybe it was just a quirk of my powers. Not that it mattered, I've never had any trouble understanding what they meant.

"Taylor! Can you come down here please?" Dad called out.

I frowned and made my way downstairs. Something must have gone wrong. If Dad needed to go to work he would have yelled up the stairs before he left.

When I got downstairs, Dad was waiting in the kitchen. His face was red in temper and he was taking deep breaths. I hadn't seen him this angry in a long time. He was always careful to control his temper around me... since Mom died. He took another deep breath, probably trying to calm, himself down before speaking.

"I just got off the phone with the police. The Detective wanted to update me on your case." My stomach fell. "They're closing the case. They're calling it a prank gone wrong."

Slumping bonelessly into a seat, I felt like I was going to be sick. Disappointment warred with my anger at the situation. I glared at my hands. _Stop shaking damn it!_ I put my hands on the table in an effort to stop them.

Dad tried again to calm himself before continuing. "The officer said he was being pressured to close the case. _'Lack of evidence'_." He practically growled.

"Evidence?" I repeated. "What about the dairy?" About six months ago I started documenting everything Emma and her friends had done to me. Printouts of the emails they sent me, times and dates of Sophia's attacks and even photos of the bruises.

Dad was really upset when he had found out just how long I had kept quiet. I'd hoped, that if I got enough I would be able to show it to someone who could make them stop.

Dad shook his head and sighed. "The police said, without witnesses to back it up, it's not much more than hear-say. They can't do anything with it"

_What!_ "No witnesses?" I almost shouted. Everything I wrote in the diary included a list of of people who were there at the time. At least a couple of people on those lists were teachers!

I could see the helplessness on Dad's face. "They did suggest taking it to a lawyer. I've already spoken to a guy in legal at work, he said we might win a civil-suit against the school but -Taylor!"

I couldn't listen any more. I ran upstairs to my room. Slamming the door behind me I threw myself on to my bed. The two bots squealed in worry at my actions.

I thought it was finally over. That they would be punished and I could get on with my life. But no, once again the teachers looked the other way. For Emma the 'upcoming model', Sophia the school track star and Madison 'too cute to harm a fly' Clements . I was just so angry, at Emma and her _friends_, at Dad, at myself. At everyone. On my desk Rewind and Rung sat quietly.

Dad followed me upstairs. He knocked gently on my door but he didn't come in.

I ignored him when he knocked again. "Taylor, no matter what your not going back to that school. I don't care what it takes. I _will _sort something out."

I buried my head into my pillow, listening to the stairs creak as Dad slowly made his way back down stairs.

At some point I fell asleep. When I woke up it was already dark out.

For awhile I laid in the dark, trying not to think. Trying not to list every name in my diary, every student and teacher that had watched Emma ruin my life.

I could understand some people not wanting to get on the wrong side of Emma. She was pretty and popular and half the school knew how much of a bitch she was. I could _really _understand not wanting to piss off Sophia. There was just something _wrong_ about her.

But for the police to say 'no witnesses' meant no one. Not even Greg and his creepy, _and rather obvious_, crush on me had spoken up. The guy was a creep and if his hands came near me again I was going to feed them to him!

_I wasn't very good at not thinking..._

If I couldn't stop myself thinking, I could at least focus on something else.

I was still going to be a hero, they couldn't take that away from me.

Dad had said I was never going back to Winslow. I wasn't sure how he was going to do that. The choices for schools were limited to Winslow, Arcadia and Immaculata on the north half of the city.

Immaculata was a Catholic school on the better side of Brockton Bay. It was private, expensive and I'm pretty sure they would frown on my '_hobby_'. Creating life from nothing tended to upset people. The thought of introducing my bots to the headmaster just to see his reaction almost made me smile.

Arcadia was considered the best in the city. It was something of an open secret that the Wards attended there. Which, I suppose, was a point in favour of joining them. It also had a waiting list months long and a grade requirement I didn't meet.

A year ago, it wouldn't have been a problem. But between them Emma and her friends had continually destroyed, stole or simply ruined every project and piece of homework I'd done for the last year. Between that and the stress, my grades were officially in the toilet.

That just left home schooling. I'm not even sure how someone would go about setting up a home school. I bet it wasn't cheap though.

_Not even Greg spoke up?_

In that moment I hated him. I hated them all.

_Greg, my own damn stalker, for fuck's sake!_

And the worst part? It would be so easy to end it all, to make it stop.

It was stupid, but I was too angry to care. Sitting up, I grabbed a notebook from my bedside table. It wouldn't take much, I just needed a tube for a barrel and a small compressed air tank. Like the sort used in BB guns. Or better yet, a chemical trigger, that would give much more power...

I knew their schedules, in a vain hope to try and avoid them.

The schools metal detectors didn't work anymore. They stopped working within a week of being installed actually. Someone kept breaking them and the school couldn't afford to repair them. _A school full of gangsters and thugs. Those detectors didn't stand a chance._

It didn't have to be a gun. A tube, some nails and some chemicals... I knew just the locker to put it in.

Maybe it was the anger, but I felt my power respond. Ideas for weapons and robots who's only purpose was to cause pain filled my mind. All of them bearing a the same symbol, it was almost serpent like –

*SCREEEE! Click Click Beep!*

The sudden noise from Rewind scared me half to death. I had been so caught up in my thoughts I had never noticed them climbing off my desk, crossing my room and climbing onto my bedside table like little monkey.

Rung was standing back, giving me a sorrowful look. He actually looked disappointed.

*You can't be thinking of something so stupid!*

"It's not-" I started, but Rewind cut me off.

*A bomb? In a school?! If your even remotely serious about this I'm going straight to your father!* he was pacing back and forth, waving his arms and beeping in agitation.

*If things are so bad then let us help you. We want to help you* He pointed at me then to Rung. *Its why you built us after all.*

His anger was burning out, fear slowly overtaking it. *What about us? What happens to Rung and me when your in prison or dead?*

My blood froze, I didn't have an answer. "But they..."

Rewind turned away from me *If...if you go through with this, we can't follow*

Before I could say anything Rung stepped forward. He put a hand on Rewind's shoulder and gently urged the little bot to give us some space.

Sitting on the edge of the table, Rung let his feet hang over the edge. Unlike Rewind, he had a full face complete with eyebrows. Over his 'eyes' he had what looked like glasses. Combined with his height and spindly frame made him look a bit bookish.

Taking his 'glasses' off, Rung sat quietly, glowing blue eyes watching me. It was odd seeing him without them, it made him look older some how.

*Taylor, I want you to stop and think. Look at what you were planning.* He gestured at the designs for a kit-bashed handgun. Along side it was a power assembly for an extremely high powered canon. I could still see it in my mind, mounted on tanks or built into gun emplacements. I wasn't sure on the final yield, only that it was powerful. How would I even power it?

*Could you really go through with this? Could you live with yourself afterwards?* sitting quietly I thought about his question. "Could I really do it? walk up to Sophia and open fire?" _No_. I couldn't do that, not to them. Not to anyone. And what if I did? Or worse, what if I missed and hit someone else. A bomb? Fuck, how many people would that hurt? _If the PRT didn't kill me outright, they would send me straight to the birdcage! _

*What is it you want?* Rung gently asked. He knew the answer, he just wanted me to say it.

"I want to be a hero," I muttered. I am going to be a Hero "...and hero's don't blow up schools."

Leaning back, I focused on that and tried to calm myself down.

Sighing, I turned back to Rung. "So that's it. I become a hero and they get away with it?"

Rung put his glasses back on and shrugged with a sad smile.

*um... actualy...* Rewind chose that point to pipe up. He then said something to Rung before the pair of them had a quick discussion about something.

Normally I could understand them but they were speaking way too fast for me to keep up.

Eventually, Rewind transformed back into a his cell phone form. Rung propped him up as he started to play a video. Whoever had filmed it wasn't very good, the camera was shaking terribly. It steadied some what, as the video went on.

"She's going to freak!" It was a girls voice. She sounded excited.

"Hey! Didn't Emma say no pictures?"

"Who cares? Not like she's going to know."

"Shhh! Shhh! here she comes."

No, it couldn't be...

"Act natural!"

My stomach started to roll.

I watched, mute with horror, as the video continued. I came into view, opened the door-

The smell. The darkness. The damp that clung to my skin and hair mixing with my own vomit. The feel of things skittering about amongst the filth. It all came flooding back and for one terrible moment I was back in the locker with the walls pressing in. Listening to them laugh as I begged to be let out. Hearing Sophia tell the other they would let me out later... she never did.

I was up and crossing my room before I knew what I was doing. I had to get out. Throwing the door open I crashed into the bathroom loudly. I barely reached the toilet before I was sick.

Dad must have heard the noise. He was there almost immediately. He grabbed my hair and held it back for me. His other hand was on my back. He was murmuring something to me like he did when I was a kid. I couldn't make out what he was saying.

The smell of vomit was just making me feel worse. I kept heaving long after my stomach was empty.

"You okay, kiddo?" Dad asked when I stopped heaving.

_Of all the stupid questions!_.

As he helped me to my feet, I nodded. I didn't trust myself to speak as the smell was awful.

Before I could move to leave the bathroom, Dad reached out and put his arms around me, pulling me into a hug. "It's alright. I'm here."

I couldn't take it any more, the dam burst and I cried. Clutching Dad's shirt tightly, I told him everything. How Emma had turned on me, the things she had said and done, the money troubles I knew he was trying to hide and what I could remember of the locker.

He didn't say a word the entire time, he just sat on the edge of the bath and hugged me.

When I had calmed down I went back to the kitchen with Dad. I felt... lighter, as corny as it sounds. I wasn't happy by any stretch, but things didn't feel as bad or as impossible.

Dad sat opposite me at the table with a cup of coffee between his hands. "Let me get this straight. Somebody filmed the entire thing. Yet both the police and the school have said there were no witnesses?"

Nodding, I explained the problem. "No-ones going to speak out against them. Emma is pretty and really popular, while Sophia is the schools track star and everyone knows she's psychotic."

Rung made a huffing noise before chastising me for misusing the term. He and Rewind were sitting on the table as I had brought them down with me. They were pretty good at hanging off my shirt with their little hands.

"I want to see this video." Dad demanded of Rewind. The little bot took a step back while Rung made frantic 'no' gestures to me.

"Dad, please. Trust me, you _don't_ want to see it. It wont help." _It would just hurt more. _

"Could we take this to the police?" I asked, latching on the idea desperately.

Looking at the little bots, Dad spoke. "Maybe, but they will want to know where it came from and why we didn't_ show them sooner._" I caught Dads unasked question.

*Beep, click!* so did Rewind.

"Rewind never showed it to me. He was afraid it would upset me."

Dad gave me an intent look "And _where_ did it come from?"

"I... I'm not sure. I think, Rewind's frame originally belonged to the girl who filmed... what happened. At a guess? He must have been left behind in a locker close to mine, somehow, I… I must have created him by accident. I think that caused my 'heart attack.'." _If it was a back fire from straining my power, does that mean It could happen again? _

It was the only thing I had managed to come up with that fit.

Dad looked at Rewind who shrugged helplessly. The only things he could remember from before he woke up was stuff that had been left on his memory and that was mostly photos that I had asked him to delete and some videos that he had deleted after I had nearly been sick again. _That girl was a freak! _

Dad ran a hand down his face, reseating his glasses on his nose. "So what can we do?"

In answer to Dad's question, Rewind switched back into a phone and brought the logo for a video sharing site and PHO on screen. Rung looked conflicted before warbling his way through an explanation and I translated it for my dad.

"We could go public. Rewind could upload the video and no one can track him anyway. After that we take the video to the police." To be honest I was amazed the footage wasn't already online. Surely this wasn't the only copy of the video?

Dad frowned and I couldn't blame him. "Are you sure?"

I knew better than he did what would happen if I did this. It would never go away. I would always be the girl in the locker.

"No, but what choice do I have? If I let them get away with this they will just do it again to someone else." I hated Winslow and everyone in it, but with me gone Emma and the others would just move on to someone else.

In the end the question was, 'Did the attack matter?' to me? Yes it did. 'Did the video really matter?' No.

I was going to be a hero, I had more important things to deal with. Like funding a suit of power-armour. If I released the video I would finally have proof and I could put this mess behind me and move on with my life.

_I would be better than them._


	7. Interlude Dragon

The project had been one of her better ideas. A joint project with Armsmaster, one of the Protectorate's best tinkers who was based at Brockton Bay to collaborate on a 'remote' suit would mostly contain the best technology she could build, with Armsmaster looking to create improvements or suggestions where he could.

So far it had been working perfectly. His suggestions had improved the suits predicted run time and manoeuvrability without losing any of the weapons systems. The first prototype had been shipped to Brockton Bay for his personal inspection.

That had been a sticking point. She could not risk people finding out what she truly was. Artificial intelligences were not illegal, just frowned upon for the potential harm they could cause. Armsmaster was adamant, however, that he needed to see and test the prototype in person. The solution was thankfully simple, a modular 'control system' that she could remove and replace with a remote system that Armsmaster could control. The 'control system' she had removed was was capable of running her full download, that could be installed at any time and was currently being safeguarded by a smaller humanoid suit.

She would let Armsmaster believe that she would use his same system, like any other human could.

Currently Armsmaster was on his evening patrol, so she was using the down time to check up on other projects.

The restrictions, chains her 'father' placed on her, prevented Dragon from multitasking beyond what a normal human was capable of so she had been forced to be creative.

For the most part this meant good time management. Humans needed sleep, she did not. As long as her 'human' identity kept the pretence of typical work hours._ For a tinker anyway._ She could continue to work while others thought she was asleep.

Some things, such as the Birdcage were monitored by lesser A.I's that her father had built and she had suborned after his death. While others were left to normal people. PHO for example, had an army of admins and moderators to run things while she was busy.

One of her minor search programs had returned a problem. It had been an Earth-Aleph search program that she had copied and modified to fit her purposes. It trawled a number of social networking sites looking for keywords.

Someone had posted a video that was being flagged by the search program and assigned a low priority tag.

Title: Girl **Attacked **at school.

Posted by: RWD

Description: A girl was attacked at Winslow High School, Brockton Bay and no one tried to help.

The victims name is Taylor, the police pulled her out of the locker hours after this video was taken.

Her attackers are: **Sophia Hess**, Emma Barnes, Madison Clements.

This happened at...

Dragon watched as Sophia Hess and her friends attacked the girl. The description contained the time and date of the attack and the names of everyone who could be seen in the video. And what was actually in the locker.

Normally, her system would have flagged the video with a higher priority. Sophia Hess was a Ward after all, but there was no mention of powers or the girls identity as Shadow Stalker.

After making a copy of the video, Dragon quickly accessed the police database for confirmation. She doubted the video was fake but it never hurt to check. It had taken a lot of work on her part to get legal access to the police networks when she first started out, but her chains often forced her to take the long way round.

She debated what to do even as she reviewed the PRT's legal files on Sophia Hess. Normally she would pull the video as soon as possible. As an honorary member of the Protectorate and the PRT she had a duty to protect a Ward's identity, but it had been online for almost an hour before her bot had found it. It was already on two different social networking sites and people were already starting to repost it. RWD himself had just posted a link to it on PHO.

In fact, trying to make it disappear would make people notice and possibly reveal Sophia's status as a Ward.

Topic: Girl Attacked at school

In: Boards ► Events ► General ► America

RWD (Archivist) :

This came from a friend.

The attack happened at lunch and she spent hours in there. It was nearly midnight when the police found her. (I wasn't there so I couldn't help.)

The police have already closed the case 'no evidence or witnesses' and the school refuses to do anything.

What followed were a dozen variations on 'OMG' and people clamouring for Sophia's head and growing.

_This could get out of hand._

Using one of her admin accounts she quickly deleted the video from PHO 'violation of terms and services', the people in the video were all under age and a desire to protect the victim were the reasons she gave.

Almost immediately the video showed up in three other threads, all posted by RWD. This time she suspended his account. The user accounts RWD_1, RWD_2 and RWD_3 were created before she could do anything and began to post to different sub forums.

Small but significant pieces of her code started to fragment in annoyance.

While a subroutine started to trace 'RWD', she logged back in to PHO.

From: Tin_Mother

To: RWD; RWD_1; RWD_2; RWD_3

I understand your frustration with the situation, but please consider the repercussions.

PHO is visited by a large number of people, including capes of all alignments. The video provides more than enough information to find both the victim or the attackers.

Vigilantism or retaliation from capes is a real possibility.

She never got a reply but 'RWD' didn't attempt to repost the video after that point.

Dragon continued to trace RWD back to two separate locations. The first was a doll makers shop in the south. Cute. The sarcasm was almost audible.

The second was a farm that raised domestic fowl. She would have laughed if she was not so frustrated.

Almost growling now, she tried again. This time the trace reached a small jam factory. Okay, that's not even trying to be subtle. She pulled up the information on the jam factory._ Small business. Family owned since it's creation. Locally renowned for its rich taste. Biggest seller was... Raspberry... Oh... Ha. Ha._

Giving up Dragon let her autonomous systems de-fragment her code while she calmed down.

Muttering several unintelligible, and in some cases unpronounceable words, she brought up RWD's PHO profile. His first account was less than a week old and he had mostly been posting in the video threads. He was very good at spotting faked or edited video footage. It really seemed to bother him. He had also made a couple of posts in the ongoing AI debate thread.

_Damn Saint for creating that._

She could not sigh without her avatar. Maybe she should keep a speaker hooked up just so she could? If the Brockton Bay Protectorate didn't already know about this, she would have to warn them. Colin, Armsmaster, would not take this well. Losing control of the the Wards was a sore spot for him.

Modelling possible outcomes, Dragon decided she should call someone with a bit more tact. She deeply respected the Tinker, but that didn't mean she was blind to his faults and his pride was, unfortunately, one of them. Calling up her contacts list, she connected to an outside line.

"Hello?"

"I'm sorry for calling so late"

"Oh good, I found something I felt you needed to see. Are you near a computer? I'm emailing it to you."

"Yes, I know,"

"I know, I haven't told him yet."

"Thank you, good night"

She ignored the quiet buzzing of her phone. While below, her prey was chatting on his phone. A drug dealer who's latest client was already walking away.

She lived for this, stalking her prey though the night. Waiting for the perfect moment to strike. The dealer finished his call and she had 10 minutes before his supplier arrived. Plenty of time. As he turned to watch the alley entrance, she pounced. He never heard her land behind him. In one quick move she put a bolt through his knee and slammed his head against wall with a crack before he had the chance to scream.

Once she was sure he wouldn't be waking any time soon and that he wouldn't be seen, she grabbed her phone

"I told you not to call me, I'm busy!" She hissed.

"I'm sorry! It's urgent! Have you been on Facespace tonight?" The randomness of the question and the panic of her friends voice made the hairs on her neck stand up.

She moved away from the dealer. She would finish dealing with him another night. "What... Why would I?"

"Someone's posted a video of us attacking Taylor. It's got our names and everything. People are freaking out about it!"

"Fuck!" She had told Emma an audience was a bad idea. If she found out which one of those stupid bitches filmed it she was going to hurt them. It wouldn't be hard to find out who it was, there was only 5 of them if you didn't include Emma and Madison. It wouldn't do any good, but it would make her feel better.

On the phone, Emma was still panicking. "What are we going to do? Dad's still trying to shut Taylor's dad up and keep the police out. If they get that video-"

Her growl cut Emma off. "Listen! Lose this phone. If you have anything at home, anything that could hurt us, burn it!"

"What? But what about the police?"

"Keep your mouth shut and let your dad deal with it. Call Madison and let her know if she squeals she's dead." The adrenaline rush was making her irritable, normally she was much more patient with the other girls.

Hanging up, she jumped back up and out of the alley before taking off across the roof tops. She needed to think.

This was bad. She was already on thin ice with the PRT. The Wards didn't bother her, they didn't have the balls to try anything. Piggie however had made her feelings clear, any excuse and she was back in juvie.

Her civilian life was over. There was no way she could go back to Winslow. That video would be all over the place. How long would it be before some wannabe Empire thug shanked her in the corridors?

The principal, the director, the PRT... They would throw her under a bus to save their own asses. _Fuck the lot of them!_

Coming to a stop she considered her options. _I've got an hour, maybe more, if I'm lucky._ The PRT and the Wards were never going to be permanent. They were all a bunch of pussies that didn't have what it took to get things done. Hell, If that moron hadn't fallen off the roof, she would never have joined them.

She had spare clothes, some money from Emma and weapons stashed around. Real weapons, not the wimpy knock out stuff the PRT forced on her. The only problem was Emma, she knew enough about them to be a problem and she didn't trust the girl to keep her mouth shut.

She took her PRT issue phone out of her pocket and chucked it off the roof, along with the burner phone Emma had given her. She didn't want the PRT tracking them.

Taking off at a run, she headed for the nearest cache. She needed to be quick, grab what she could and lay low. The PRT wouldn't put that much effort into finding her and once they gave up she could deal with the Emma and her sheep.


	8. 2-1

It's been a week since Rewind posted the video. Reactions were... explosive to say the least. Most of them were horrified, demanding Sophia and the others be arrested. Others were more explicit and in one case, out right twisted. _The creep offering to 'take care of me' was probably the worst. _

Dad's friend was supposed to visit later today so Dad had taken the day of work. He said that she had wanted to visit sooner, but had been busy at work.

I knew Dads friend worked for the PRT. Maybe there were more truth to the rumours than I thought? Shadow Stalker had vanished recently and PHO was buzzing with rumours. The most popular theory was that she had finally gone too far and killed someone. There had always been rumours of her aggression. One guy claimed she had nearly killed his buddy by put an arrow through his knee and left him for dead in an alley.

On a better note, I had finally started work on the Lancia model. At about half a meter in length it was going to be the largest thing I had built so far. Unlike Rung, who I put together in a day as a experiment, I had spent all week on this one and still had work to do. I had a specific job I wanted him to do, so I'm being careful about the parts I used and what extras I included. Plus, I had a theory about my power I wanted to test.

Right now, I was killing time by making a few small alterations that should improve battery life.

The base for my newest bot was an expensive RC kit that fit into the model. I had also created what I jokingly called a 'comms package'. Basically it was the guts of a cheap handset/burner phone, dismantled for its cell network transmitter and battery, mated to a Wifi dongle to give him net access. I also pulled some high quality sound equipment from some wrecked cars in the junkyard. That's also where I came up with his name. Wheeljack.

I had also done some experiments with Rewind. With a lot of coaching, he had been able to speak in English. The problem was, it came out stilted, flat and emotionless. Like a text to speech system. He'd gone back to his normal method almost immediately.

"Taylor, she's here!" Dad called out.

Putting down my soldering iron, I made sure everything was turned off before picking up Rewind and my notebook to make my way upstairs.

Following the sound of Dad talking I walked into the front room. Stopping dead the moment I saw who he was talking too.

_What._

Sitting there, opposite dad was Miss Militia. The Protectorate's second in command, a life long hero, knew my dad?

_What?_

The flag patterned scarf she wore as a mask hid her lower face but she seemed to be smiling at something Dad had said.

_What?!_

Dad glanced at the doorway. "Ah, here she is. Miss Militia, you remember my daughter, Taylor?

I still hadn't moved. My expression must have been comical because Dad laughed and even Miss Militia looked amused.

"Yes, I remember. You've grown since we last met. You're starting to look like your mother."

Well this explained how Dad got that signed poster that was on my wall. _And all the other bits and pieces he gave me over the years. _

My mind went blank, I was expecting an office worker, probably Dads age and most likely overweight. Not a genuine hero. "Umm… we've met?" I practically squeaked. O_h yeah, real smooth. _

Miss Milita's eyes were shining with humour. "Yes, but you were only a baby at the time."

Sitting down next to Dad I put Rewind down on the coffee table.

_Okay, deep breath. Think before you say anything. _"Dad said you wanted talk to me?"

"You're father told me you have powers, a tinker if what he says is true?"

Nodding nervously, I gestured to Rewind who transformed and almost immediately started squeaking questions.

*Oh wow! This is incredible! Do you mind if I record this? Taylor's first meeting with a hero! This could be historically important someday. Can I ask how you met Mr Hebert?*

Trying not to laugh, I decided not to translate his questions. "This is Rewind. Who is, apparently, a fan." He was practically bouncing in excitement. Hell I could feel it through whatever faint bond seemed to exist between me and my bots.

Honestly, it would have been adorable if I wasn't torn between doing the same thing, wishing I had better clothes on or pestering her with questions of my own. _My dad knows Miss Militia? How!?_

From what I could see of her face, Miss Militia was more amused than anything else. I suppose she was used to dealing with excited fans. Reaching out she allowed Rewind to take a finger in his hands in a sort of hand shake. Letting rewind climb onto her palm she lifted Rewind up to get a better look at him.

"Yes, definitely a Tinker. I think you would get along well with Kid Win."

"You mean _If_ I joined the wards." I asked

"Yes, If."

Putting Rewind back down, her demeanour changed. She sat straighter in her seat and her voice became much more authoritative. "Before we go any further I need to explain a few things to you both. First, regardless of what you decide here, I will not tell anyone about you or your powers. The PRT takes keeping the identities of capes, of all alignments, seriously and anything discussed today is strictly between us."

Her voice softened. "I will, however, tell you to be careful."

"Official PRT policy is to let you make the first move. Unless you approach the PRT first or become an obvious threat to the public you will be left alone."

My mind flashed back to my 'almost bombing' and I quickly squashed the memory.

With her, clearly rehearsed, speech done. Miss Militia eased her posture, getting more comfortable in her seat and relaxing the atmosphere. "Usually at this point, I would try to identify when you received your powers. Your father told me on Monday that you had seen the video so I think we all know when it was."

I was glad Miss Militia didn't want to talk about it. Once with Dad was enough. I wasn't surprised she had seen the video, Rewind told me that a number of people, including the police, have tried to censor it. The police had already been in contact and told us not to contact Emma or her father.

"The PRT calls them trigger events and they are almost always traumatic. It's something all para-humans have in common and it is considered rude to ask about it. So why don't you tell me more about your powers?"

Shaking off the lingering gloom, I opened my notebook and showed her some of my more complete designs. "Ever since I woke up in the hospital, I've been getting flashes of different ideas. They mostly centre around these guys but I can build other stuff too. Mostly I've just been designing stuff for later. I can't build any of it yet." Despite that, I still felt a bit of pride at what I could do.

Miss Militia nodded as she leafed through the pad. "That's normal Tinker behaviour. Most have mentioned a compulsion to build the things they can see and most the Tinkers I have met have been prolific note takers. Always scribbling some idea or another down or trying to take things apart to see how they work."

I blushed, as I had three or four different note books scattered around the house now. They were all full of random ideas and a basement that was rapidly filling with salvaged junk for parts.

Putting the pad down she gave me a very pointed look. "Your father told me you were having problems with your power."

I glanced at dad, who refused to meet my eyes. I know my heart attack scared him, but I was still hurt that he went behind my back to contact the PRT in the first place.

Sighing, I explained about my touch power and the effects it had on me.

"Taylor, hearing this, I really do think the Wards are the best place for you. The PRT has people who can help you work out why this happens and the best medical support available. More, it would offer you and your father protection."

She sighed before continuing. "This actually brings me onto the other thing I needed to discuss with you. Tinkers do not stay hidden long. Many of the gangs have learned to watch for the signs."She indicated my notepad. "Prolific note taking, purchases of seemingly random equipment. Especially electronic parts will eventually get noticed and I know for a fact Armsmaster and I suspect, the gangs, monitor the junkyards."

That might be trouble. Dad had picked stuff up for me a couple of times and I had gone there on my own for parts for Wheeljack.

"This is why I strongly suggest joining the Wards. Tinkers are prized by the gangs. The ABB has recently recruited a Tinker and have been quick to brag about it. I know the Empire will be just as quick to address the issue. Mostly, this means bringing in outside help. But if they find an independent _white_ Tinker, I doubt they would bother to ask nicely. Your fathers crowbar wouldn't be able to protect you."

She shot Dad a pointed look, making him chuckle, albeit weakly. "You weren't complaining at the time."

"No, I was busy dealing with his friends at the time." Miss Militia looked amused. "Though I_do_ remember what you said afterwards." Both laughed at the memory, but Dad was blushing lightly.

_I don't think I want to know._ From the puzzled beeping, I think Rewind _did_ want to know.

Miss Militia pulled a tablet computer out of the messenger bag beside her.

"Of course, it's not all about protection from the gangs. There are a number of benefits for joining the wards. All Tinkers are supplied with a workspace and any raw materials they need. They are also given access to the PRT Tinker network. That lets you trade ideas with PRT Tinkers across the country." She passed the tablet to me. "That has all the details on it."

"wouldn't I have to join the Wards?"

"Yes, as you are under eighteen you would be a Ward. I know you are currently not attending school." I glanced at dad again. "The PRT is legally required to ensure you receive an education. In most cases that means transferring you to a school of our choice".

"You mean, I could go to Arcadia with the Wards?"

Miss Militia smiled. "I can't comment on that, but I can't see a problem arranging your transfer to Arcadia if that is what you wish."

I felt torn, moving to Arcadia would mean continuing the teen drama I wanted to avoid. On the other hand part of me still wanted to go. Mom would have wanted it, being a college teacher herself.

Flicking through the tablet, I looked at the potential benefits for Wards. It mentioned the education, but in much more detailed terms. Wards also got paid and a trust fund to help with college and university fees. There were also restrictions.

Any Tinkertech used, by either a member of the Wards or Protectorate, had to be tested and cleared by the PRT. And anything created by a Tinker with their resources belonged to the PRT, including patents. If I did create anything that can be reproduced and sold later, I would receive a percent of the profits that would go into the trust.

"What about my bots?" I asked. "Rewind isn't the only one I've built." Rung stepped out from behind the sofa, waving nervously. I had spotted him sneaking into the room earlier and I'm pretty sure Miss Militia had, too.

Miss Militia watched Rung pull himself onto the coffee table. His long limbs should have made it easy, but his complete lack of grace worked against him. "That depends. I understand they are your speciality and that makes them important to you. If you joined the Wards you would have to answer a lot of questions about just how independent they are and what their limits are. But the important matter is, can they self replicate?

I hesitated. Yes, in theory, they could build the base frame and other parts. That was what I was building Wheeljack for. But without those would be useless without the Trinity of parts my power created. That would have to suffice. I shook my head, "Not without me, no. There are key parts that can only be built with my power."

Miss Militia nodded. "Then I think they would be fine. Anything more would be dealt with by Armsmaster or another Protectorate Tinker."

The thought of meeting one of the biggest tinkers around was incredible and made me feel nervous and excited at the same time.

"Before you make a decision, however there is one last thing we need to discus." She shifted uncomfortably for a minute before reaching up and removing her mask.

From the look on Dad's face, he hadn't expected this either.

Miss Militia visibly braced herself before speaking. "What I need to tell you wont be pleasant and it can _not_ leave this room."

(pov- all)

Removing her mask was a risk but not much of one. She had told Danny and Annette her identity years ago. She believed she could trust his daughter.

Now she just needed the girl to trust her.

"My name is Hannah and I need you both to listen to what I have to say."

Her role as a hero and her position with the Protectorate was important to her. But friends came first and Sophia's actions were unconscionable. What's more, if Taylor joined the wards, she would need to be willing to trust Hannah and the Wards. Hannah doubted that trust would last when she learned Sophia's identity.

"When your father first contacted me, he never told me the name of your attackers. When I found out about your trigger event, I was horrified to realise that I knew one of them."

"What? How would you?... a Ward! One of them is a Ward! Who?" Taylor quickly went from puzzled to angry.

Hannah Sighed, the girl really was bright.

On the table, Rewind transformed. Images of the different wards flashed across his screen, along with images of Emma, taken from the web.

None of them matched Emma. she was a little shorter than Taylor, with a curvy build. There were only two girls in the local Wards. Vista who was much too young and Shadow Stalker who, from what could be seen under that cloak, had more of a runner's build… and no one had seen Shadow Stalker since the video went out. _What if someone wanted her out of sight_. Taylor thought to herself.

"Sophia is Shadow Stalker, isn't she?" Danny looked between the two women, trying to keep up.

"Yes."

Taylor went very still. "Let me guess, if I join the Wards you want me to drop the charges." Her voice was like ice. Smooth, cold, brittle and one wrong move away from breaking.

"What!" Danny had always had a temper, not that Hannah was ever scared or intimidated by him. "You've seen the video, how can you let someone like that go unpunished?" Danny was almost purple and for one horrible moment Taylor thought he was going to have a heart attack. "I asked for help and now your telling me to just let it go! They nearly killed my daughter!"

Hannah held her hands up in a calming manner, she needed to get things back under control. "Danny, please! I am not going to ask you to drop the charges. What Sophia did was wrong and she deserves to be punished."

She gave Danny a chance to calm down, or at least act like he had, before continuing.

"This situation should never have happened. Winslow was supposed to inform the PRT if the girl acted up in anyway. When we found out about the video, an investigation was launched about Sophia and her actions." Hannah's body was tense as she clamped down on her own anger at the situation.

"Sophia's caseworker and the principal decided between themselves to keep quiet about the girls actions. Winslow received donations for having a Ward on the premises and her caseworker thought it would be a good place to find information on the gangs. I'm not sure how they kept the police from investigating your attack, though I suspect Mr Barnes was involved there."

"Why was she even a Ward to begin with?" Danny ground out. "That kind of behaviour doesn't come out of nowhere."

"No, it doesn't." If any of this ever got back to the director, she would be spending the next few years at a Simurgh containment zone. Hannah had been with the PRT too long to think the director would be publicly punished over this. A private reprimand, with her actions being watched more closely for a time was more likely.

"Shadow Stalker was apprehended after she dropped a suspect of a roof. My understanding is, she was trying to interrogate him. Scare him with threats of dropping, when she lost her grip. He survived, but Sophia was soon arrested and given a choice, join the Wards or serve time in juvenile detention."

"Why would that even be an option?" Danny asked.

"Partially because the PRT and the protectorate is out numbered by and because everyone is needed to stop the Endbringers. But mostly because of Saurian," Was the start of her response. "When he first triggered he was an enforcer for some mob in his home city. He was not a pleasant person from what I know."

Sitting back in her chair Hannah let her mind wander back to the story of a man she had never met. "Eventually, of course, he was caught. But then an Endbringer attacked and the local Protectorate forces were too few in number to even fight it." No one knew where an Endbringer would strike next, only that they followed a rough timeline of four to five months between attacks. Local Protectorate forces would have to hold the monster off long enough for reinforcements to arrive. There was never enough fore warning.

"Its not well known and rarely happened, but directors are allowed to release prisoners as part of the Endbringer truce. Saurian was one of the prisoners given the choice of fighting or staying in there cell. When the fight was over he was the only one to return to the PRT. He had a strong sense of honor which demanded he return. He was offered a place in the Protectorate. "

Sighing, Hannah lent forward and looked Taylor in the eyes. "He died, trying to single handedly hold off the Slaughterhouse Nine. He gave the the Protectorate time to arrive and drive the surviving members off."

"Since then, it has become standard policy to offer people who meet certain conditions a place in the Protectorate or the Wards. To try and rehabilitate people whenever possible. I'm not allowed to name them, but there have been more successes than failures." She didn't bother explaining what those conditions were, or what restrictions they were put under. Even letting her know the had 'new' identities jeopardised them.

"And Sophia?" Taylor quietly asked.

"Was a failure, a big one that I can promise you wont be happening again."

"How can you be so sure?" Danny snapped.

"The investigation into Shadow Stalker has revealed a number of failings. To address this, the Wards are being relocated back to the Protectorate HQ in the bay and I am taking direct responsibility for them. I wont allow this to happen again."

"Why are you telling us this? And why wait till now?" Hannah could almost laugh, Danny was better at politics than he gave himself credit for.

Meeting Taylors eyes again Hannah spoke. "Sophia vanished the night you released the video."

Taylor paled dramatically "I never-!"

Hanna cut Taylor of with a laugh. "Taylor. The video was posted by someone called RWD, you have a robot called Rewind. That same person was also able to avoid being tracked by Dragon. Something only another Tinker, or something built by one could do."

Taylor was still pale, but forced herself to meet Hannah's eyes. "Am _I_ in trouble?" The defiance in her voice made her sound so much like her mother it was scary. Hannah could swear Danny actually shivered.

Chuckling, Hannah shook her head. "No, you did what you felt was necessary. And no one can blame you for feeling desperate." She would let Danny explain to her why she shouldn't do it again.

"As far as we can tell, someone warned Sophia and she decided to take her chances. When she's caught, then it's another violation on top of the others we have uncovered."

From everything Hannah had seen since the investigation was launched, Sophia was unstable. Master influence was quickly ruled out when the Wards admitted just how bad the girls attitude was and her tendency to run off solo. _And the director turned a blind eye to all of it! _That thought rankled her. The woman took control of the Wards, then ignored them as people. She was treating those children like tools.

"I don't care what other people say, you deserved to know the truth."

She took a couple of minutes to explain just what the PRT was doing to track down Sophia and that she doubted Sophia would make a move on Taylor, but she should be careful and avoid going out after dark just to be safe.

Hannah also passed Taylor a taser. "Try to keep it with you, and if anyone tries to bother you, use it." Standing up she showed Taylor how best to hold and aim the weapon before they both sat back down.

Taylor took a breath while clutching the weapon. Some of the life had returned to her eyes while Hannah was teaching her how to use it. "What's going to happen to Emma and Sophia?"

"The police will prosecute Miss Barnes and Miss Clements. With the video as evidence and the PRT backing them the they won't have much trouble. I understand both girls have already received death threats online and one is willing to tell the police everything. Sophia, however was already on probation, so she would usually be sent straight back to juvenile prison."

"In order to protect Sophia's family from reprisal for her actions as an independent and Ward, her case will be handled separately." Hannah held up a hand to forestall any complaints "As far as the public will know, Sophia is a parolee that has absconded rather than face punishment. And Shadow Stalker has been rumoured to be transferred to a Simurgh containment zone." A_ common punishment for Wards or Protectorates who get into trouble._ "The administration at Winslow are also facing charges so they will most likely offer to settle out of court and you will be receiving compensation from the PRT, through a third party."

By the time Hanna had finished both Danny and Taylor had mostly calmed down.

(POV: Taylor)

I was still thinking about everything Mi-Hannah had said when she pulled her scarf back up.

"I think that is everything for now. However, I don't want you to make a decision today. We are all a bit tense and I don't want you to make a decision you come to regret. Keep the tablet, look through everything and talk it over with your father. If you wish to talk to me, for any reason, here is my number. You can reach me at any time and anything said stays between us." She passed me a business card with her telephone number and email address on it. Her private address had also been written on there.

Dad walked Miss Militia out. I could hear them quietly talking in the kitchen while I slowly read through the tablet. If only to distract myself. I was half tempted to bring it to life.

Rewind and Rung made there way off the coffee table and onto the sofa. Rewind chose to jump the gap. Taking a long run up, he crossed the table and leapt. Falling just short of the sofa so only his arms made it. Scrambling wildly, his hand managed to grip the fabric to let him pull himself up.

Rung chose to climb calmly off the table and then up the sofa. Eventually, both bots positioned themselves on the back of the sofa so they could read over my shoulder. I would have to ask them what they thought about all this later.

I was most of the way through it, and had almost put Sophia out of my head, when Dad came back into the front room.

He sat down next to me with a sigh, I'm sure today hadn't gone as well as he had hoped. "Well, putting what that _girl _did aside, what do you think?"

"I... I'm not sure. The money and the resources sound good but there's a _lot _of restrictions on Tinkers." I showed dad the list, there were nearly one hundred rules for tinkers alone. A lot of them were situational and others would never apply to me, I didn't do wet-ware. "And I can't just ignore Sophia being a Ward, even if they didn't like her they should have done something sooner."

"Yes, they should have. For what it's worth, it's been a long time since I've seen Hannah so angry. She hides it well." Dad nodded as he thought."Alright, I can't force you into it. _I _would feel better if you did." Dad leaned over to give me a hug. It felt stiff and awkward. But I could tell he was trying. Standing up he made for the kitchen. "Just think about it, that's all I ask. We can talk about this again another time. And if you do decide not to join, that you want to go it alone... I want to know, so no sneaking out. You will take your little phone, robot, thing with you at all times. And once we get this mess with school sorted out, I want that to be your priority. Your future's important."

That... felt fair. _And rehearsed._ To me, I had planned to keep Rewind with me at all times anyway. Mom always made it clear how important she felt an education was. Dad was just trying to keep to it.

_Oh! _"Rewind? Delete anything you recorded after Miss Militia took her mask off!"

Rewind let out a whine of disappointment.


	9. 2-2

A week after meeting Miss Militia, nearly two weeks worth of work in total, I was finally finished. On the workbench in front of me was the completed Wheeljack. All he was needed was a Spark. "Oh~If~I~only~had~a~heart!~" played from Rewind and I had to stop myself from giggling. Eventually.

The last week had been quiet. Between housework, working on Wheeljack and jogging, time had flown by. If I was going to be a hero, I would need to be in better shape. I had decided to start jogging, and my first day had brought home just how unfit I was. Skinny apparently didn't mean healthy. _Maybe I should work on a medic or something next? _

Dad was at work. After spending the the last two week at home, the days were starting to blur together. It had been nice though, I felt better than I had in months. Turns out that unexpected vacations and interesting projects did a world of good for the mind.

Rewind was sitting of to one side on the workbench, ready to call for help using a prerecorded message if something went wrong. Rung was next to him, giving me worried looks. The new model was almost half a meter in length, this was the largest thing I had ever tried to create and I would be lying if I said I wasn't worried.

Laying my hands on the Lancia model, I let it map itself in my mind. Once that was done I started pushing my power into it. Its large size had provided plenty of empty space. I had added as many different gadgets and ideas as I had thought of. _Actually, that was not true, I added everything I could_ _build__. _

Once my power had 'filled' the model, I concentrated on what I wanted. _'An, engineer, someone who can help build things'_ and pushed.

I could see the changes my power was making to the model, the excess mass was being converted into parts but it wasn't enough. For a horrifying moment, I couldn't breathe. The world went grey as my vision blurred and quickly began to fade while my heart was pounding frantically in my chest.

The spark chamber formed, the blue-white spark bursting to life just as I fell.

*TSCHE-CHU-CHU-CHU-TSCHE*

I managed to catch myself on the workbench. Unable to hold my weight, I let myself slowly slide to the floor.

*Taylor! Are you okay?!* Rewind jumped off the workbench and ran towards me. He was one wrong word away from calling for help.

Like the others, Wheeljack had transformed the moment he woke. He jumped to the floor, worried blue optics regarded me. The fins on the sides of his head flashing as he took my hand and felt for my pulse.

"I'm fine, really" I gasped. Idly, I noticed Wheeljack would need a chair or a box to be able to reach the workbench fully. He wasn't that the big, being only just more than half a meter tall. "I'm... I'm just going to sit here for a minute, then maybe I should take a nap." _And maybe some paracetamol and a __really__cold drink. _I was really sweating.

They shared a worried glance, but didn't say anything. By the time I had caught my breath, I was able to stand and shakily make my way upstairs. My legs felt like jelly. Wheeljack stood behind me, trying to keep me balanced and stop me from falling. I made it as far as the sofa before crashing for the rest of the day.

By the time Dad got home I was back on my feet. Now for the hard part. "Hey Dad? You remember that old car model I was working on?"

He took it well, mostly.

* * *

><p>Like Rung, it took Wheeljack a day or so to really find his voice, but I knew almost immediately when he had.<p>

Dad and I had been sitting down to dinner when something exploded in the basement. Dad got to the door first and he refused to let me see what had happened till he checked it out.

Wheeljack was on the floor, his chest and face scorched and the broken remains of something was on the workbench.

"Er… whoops?" Wheeljack wore a face plate that covered his lower face but the fins on his head lit up when he spoke. At the moment they were a dull pink, showing his embarrassment. "Don't worry, I think I know what went wrong." A quick check with my powers showed he was unhurt. It still took an hour to clean his armour.

That was something I hadn't noticed till now. All my bots were much tougher than they should have been. Rewind knocked Rung down the stairs yesterday and there wasn't a mark on him. There was a slight dent in the wall though.

Something to into later.

* * *

><p>(Dragon)<p>

Welcome to the Parahumans Online message boards.

You are currently logged in, Tin_mother (administrator)

You are viewing:

• Threads you have replied to

• AND Threads that have new replies

• OR private message conversations with new replies

• Thread OP is displayed.

• Ten posts per page

• Last ten messages in private message history.

• Threads and private messages are ordered chronologically.

**Topic: Containment Foam**

In: Boards ► General ► America

Wheeljack (Inventor)

Does anyone know how to make containment foam? I had a few ideas about it I wanted to test out. You see

**{COMMENT EDITED}**

**Containment foam is a restricted substance that is under copyright with Dragons Lair, R&D. **

**Also please stop giving people strange ideas.**

Post edited by **Tin_mother**

Dragon shook her metaphorical head. This was the fifth time in the last ten days she had warned Wheeljack about his requests. _Though that idea does have merit. _Most of the forum users had decided he was either cracked or some kind of tinker.

Given her inability to track his location, Dragon suspected he was related to 'RWD'. Their accounts had been created within a month of each other and she traced him to 'Hill Valley' California, a place that never existed. And Dunmurry, Belfast. They apparently shared a sense of humour.

If he would just approach the R&D company she had established years ago, she would be more receptive of his ideas.

Dragons Lair R&D was a company she formed in her early days. It gave her an air of legitimacy and made ordering in bulk from suppliers easer. Now that she was established as a hero and a tinker she kept it around for tax, copywrite and marketing reasons.

Giving up for now she turned back to her conversation. 'Rng' was another new user, but he had been nothing but polite and respectful. He also had a good understanding of psychiatry. They had been talking about the compulsions all Tinkers had to deal with and the possible effects it could have on potential relationships.

His original post, had been a well thought-out essay on the psychological after-effects of masters, including studies and sources to backup his theories.

* * *

><p>(Wheeljack)<p>

Letting out a sigh, Wheeljack went back to work. The containment foam grenades were just too promising an idea to abandon.

They would be much more effective than conventional 'stun' tactics. None of the possibly messy side effects you got with electric shocks and no need to worry about body mass ratios and health conditions that applied to chemical weapons. You did not have to worry about suffocation in most cases. _And less chance of them getting back up._ He muttered to himself.

Looking back, he probably shouldn't have posted that request. Or any of the others now that he thought about it. The problem, he knew, was that he had a tendency to let his excitement get the better of him.

Picking up the tablet Taylor had been given, he brought up his custom web browser. There were dozens of websites that speculated about the possible make-up of containment foam. If he ruled out the more blatantly silly ones, maybe with a bit of experimentation he could find something that worked.

Taylor was out on her daily run, so it was just him at the moment. He would have liked to go with her, as a chance to really use his wheels would really help him think. Unfortunately, for now he would have to settle for letting his engine idle while in his Lancia form. They had to stay hidden, at least until Taylor was ready to make her first appearance as a hero. _That reminds me, I should look into a weapon for myself. _

He had already distilled most of the chemicals he needed from different cleaning products. So he set to work. His first few attempts, produced nothing but a bad smell. The fifth however, resulted in an excellent adhesive. He committed that recipe to memory.

Now, he just had to wait for Taylor to get home so she could unstick his hands from the workbench.

* * *

><p>Shortened brush in hand, Rung looked carefully at the mask in front of him. Taylor had bought almost a dozen of them for a couple of dollars. They were thin, cheap white plastic in the shape of a face. Taylor was upstairs with her father, leaving him, Rewind and Wheeljack to continue working.<p>

"I still don't see why we have to do this," Wheeljack complained. "These masks will barely hide Taylors identity. Not to mention the problems she's going to have with her glasses. She would be better off with a custom polymer, shaped to fit comfortably on her face."

Rung waited patiently, while his friend let his imagination run away with him. "We could integrate lenses to match her current prescription and even put an augmented reality interface with it."

*Jack, do you have... any of that?* Rewind said from where he was sitting.

"Well... no."

*Do you even have the _tools_ to make any of it?*

"... Now you're just being rude."

Miss Militia's warning had made Taylor wary of digging through junkyards for parts until she could hide her identity. After Wheeljack had been brought up to speed, Taylor had sat down with the three of them to discuss the future.

Taylor wanted to be an independent hero. After everything she had been through, Rung was not surprised her trust in others, especially authority, had been shaken. He would have to bring that up with her at her next session. If she wanted people to trust her, she would need to be willing to trust them.

Rung felt Taylor should join the Wards, a dedicated team and possible friendships would help the girl grow as a person. Rewind was against it. While he agreed with what they were trying to do, he was holding a grudge about what happened to Taylor. Wheeljack however was torn, he liked the resources they offered but one look at the restrictions had left him fuming for well over an hour.

Putting that to one side, Rung focused on what Taylor had asked. Using the insignia she had created as a guide, Rung started to paint the mask. Behind him, Wheeljack collected several of the masks and wandered off to tinker.

* * *

><p>(Danny)<p>

"Are you sure this will work?" Danny asked as Taylor and Wheeljack made the finishing touches to what had once been a pair of computers he had pulled from a dumpster, complete with monitors.

The casings had been removed and copper tubes and wires joined everything together.

"It should," muttered Wheeljack with his head still stuck inside the left case.

Taylor climbed out from underneath the desk, the excitement on her face went a long way to make him feel better. The last couple of weeks since she left school had brought back some of the old Taylor. He'd give her a bit more time to recover before he mentioned school, the sponsorship program Medhal had contacted him about sounded promising. He assumed someone involved with it had seen the video.

The police had arrested those... _girls _. Alan was trying his best to get his daughter out of trouble, but all he was doing was slowing things down. Winslow was trying to settle out of court, but he wanted to let them stew before he spoke to them again. He had to get some satisfaction after all.

She was smiling more and always eager to explain what she was doing to him, even if he didn't understand it all.

"Wheeljack has over-clocked both processors. Its not much, but with them running in parallel it makes a big difference. The pipes are a quick and simple, non-conductive oil, cooling system-"

Danny let the words wash over him. He understood enough to know that, between them, they had built an under powered supercomputer.

"Wheeljack did most of the coding for the operating system. It's a work in progress, but it's better than nothing."

When everything was in place, Taylor moved to the other side of the room so she was standing next to him and away from any possible fallout. "Okay Jack, turn it on!"

Nodding to Taylor, Wheeljack connected the power cable and pressed the large blue button to start the boot sequence.

The whole rig whirred to life, there was a faint gurgling noise from the pump, but things settled quickly.

The monitors lit up as text scrolled rapidly across the screen. When it cleared a simple blue desktop appeared with single message box.

**[Teletraan 0.1 alpha: online]**

* * *

><p>(Taylor)<p>

"Okay, try it now." Wheeljack called. He was sitting in front of Teletraan, with a mess of different windows open in front of him. A modified USB lead went from his wrist to the computer.

We were testing a device Wheeljack had made me, originally based on a bluetooth. It gave me two-way communication with all my bots and included a projector that could create an augmented reality interface on my glasses.

A tap of a button on the side brought up a simple wireframe keyboard on the table in front of me. 'Tapping' at the keys caused text to appear on Teletraan, but it was slow. Latency was an issue. Bandwidth would also be a problem when it came to more complex applications.

"Hmm... Okay, what if I tried this?" Wheeljack changed something on Teletraan. I yelped as I was blinded by the sudden flash of light reflecting off my glasses and into my eyes.

Despite his tendency to cause explosions, Wheeljack was a godsend. He was practically a Tinker all by himself, one who specialised in improvisation.

Between us, we had converted the old coal chute into a makeshift forge. It was too small to do a lot with, but it could be used to reclaim lead from old circuit boards. A heat lamp and a vacuum motor made a very small vacuum press, for cheap plastic from a hobby store. We were still working on Teletraan but it was now connected to a printer that we had converted into a circuit-board printer. With a bit of work we might even be able to create a 3D printer.

After Miss Militia's visit, Dad and I had decided to be more careful about buying and selling electronics. The money had been useful but there was just too much chance of being recognised.

I was careful, recycling and reusing whenever possible. But I knew money was going to become a problem. Between the fee's the junkyards charged and the costs of stuff that couldn't be salvaged, my savings were almost gone.

I decided I would try my luck at the old boat graveyard near the docks. It was a long shot, since most of it would be rusted, but there just was no good solution at this point.

The Docks are ABB territory. I wanted a costume, or at least mask before I went there. While I had plans for a full suit of power-armour, I needed something I could use now to keep my identity hidden while looking for scrap.

In the end, I went for simplicity. Black jeans, cheap bike riding gloves and an old black hoody to hide my hair. I was still debating about the mask. That just left something to defend myself with.

Dad had given me a can of pepper spray when I started jogging in the morning. Wheeljack, however, had other ideas.

I looked down at the weapon on the worktop. It had started out as the TASER Miss Militia had given me. Wheeljack had taken one look at the weapon before shaking his head. "Why, would you want a single shot device that leaves you tethered to your attacker?" he asked. I had to admit, he had a point.

In the end we stripped the batteries and voltage amplifier circuit from the handle before building a new body from scratch.

The result was a single shot pistol. Made from mostly plastic with some metal reinforcing it. It used an electromagnet to fire a large shell, about the size of a 12 gauge round, containing a battery, a step-up transformer and a pair of prongs. On impact it would deliver enough charge to put a normal person down.

As soon as Wheeljack and I finished making the ammo for it. It would be ready to go.

"Okay, that should be round number te-!" Wheeljack was cut off by a sound, halfway between a zap and a bang. I didn't bother turning around. "Erm... three rounds done."

* * *

><p>It was already getting late when I made my way through to boat graveyard.<p>

Really, I should have waited for the morning but the forecast for the next couple of days was bad and I wanted to at least get an idea about what I could use.

I was in what passed as for my 'costume'. Although my hood and a scarf covered my face, I had decided to try the mask wheeljack had made for me. It was made by layering the cheap plastic masks with an epoxy Jack had created. He had also managed to shape the lenses from my spare pair of glasses to fit they eye holes on the mask.

Special features would be fitted to later models.

As I had promised Dad, Rewind was safely in my pocket and my 'stun gun' was in the other. I was also wearing the Bluetooth device Wheeljack had modified for me. WE had given up on the AR system for now but the communication functions worked fine.

Between Leviathan and the weak world economy, the docks had been on the decline for years before the union strikes. Then some of the more militant dockworkers had taken some of the larger ships out into the bay and sunk them. That was the final nail in the coffin. Large shipping vessels could no longer get into the bay and the fishing industry had already moved on, the ships left in the bay were trapped and most were either left at there moorings or beached nearby.

In theory this was ABB territory, but the lack of people and business meant they barely paid it any attention.

Which made it a good place to test some of my equipment.

I had brought a rucksack with me, inside was a short handled crowbar and some wire cutters. I was mostly here to check things out, but that didn't mean I wouldn't grab anything of interest while I was here.

The graveyard was practically a maze of rusted hulls. I didn't want to go too far in but I had to make sure I wasn't seen. I found what looked like an old tug boat, the side had a ladder built in that didn't look too far gone so I climbed up.

That's when I found out my power works through my gloves. Looking back on it, I really should have checked that out. At least it meant I wouldn't have to touch any of... this... directly. The metal hull was more rust than anything else and most of the wooden deck was rotten through. Ignoring that I tried to focus my power on what I could still use.

There was some wiring in bridge that was mostly okay, but the few circuit boards I could see, looked like they had been chewed by rats or corroded. _Can't say I'm surprised. Salt-water and no maintenance meant a lot of this is going to be rusted to hell. _

"Right!" I stood up and turned roughly in the direction of home. "Comms check! Wheeljack, can you hear me okay?"

"Loud and clear Ta-" he cut himself off before finishing my name. "I know this is encrypted and everything, but... did you ever get round to picking a name?" _Damn! _

"No, I forgot."

One of my bots laughed.

"Oh, bite me! Just use 'T' for now, we can workout something else later."

Giving up on the tug, I climbed down and started moving from one ship to another.

* * *

><p>After about an hour I decided to call it a day. It was dark, I was tired and filthy. I had a few things stuffed into my bag, mostly small, simple stuff my 'forge' could melt down.<p>

"Hey, Jack? I think we need to see about building a better forge. I'm also going to need a cutting tool next time."

While we bounced ideas back and forth, I made my way to the entrance. I was so caught up in my conversation, I never saw the creature until it slammed into me.

A wall of exposed flesh, fur and bone hit me just as I rounded a corner. It knocking the wind out of me and sent me spinning. Something had also stabbed into my shoulder.

I was just climbing to my feet, clutching my shoulder. When there was a crunch behind me, turning I found myself face to face with a man in a red demon mask.

I panicked and tried to pull my gun. It was caught in my pocket. The blow to my stomach came out of nowhere. It felt like I had just been run through with a steal girder. On reflex I curled into a ball, waiting for the next blow.

That's when the explosions started.

* * *

><p>AN: site removed some of the formatting, i think i've got it all back in now.<p> 


	10. 2-3

Winded, I curled into a ball, covered my ears and waited for the noise to stop.

Wheeljack and Rewind were shouting in my ear. They were demanding to know what was going on.

"Cape... Red mask... fast," I managed to gasp out. My attacker apparently wasn't interested in me. By the time I had caught my breath, he had already vanished.

A wall of ice was blocking the way out. _Fuck!_

I tried not to panic. Really I tried. I was in the middle of a cape battle, I had to get out of here. I ran back the way I came, deeper into the graveyard. There were plenty of ways in and out of here, one of them had to be clear. If not, I could always find somewhere to hide and wait things out.

My shoulder was still hurting, a quick check showed a shallow gash. It was bleeding but I would be okay for now. I needed to move fast so I tossed my bag away. There was nothing important in there, nothing nearly as important as my life anyway. In the distance I could hear what sounded like dogs and the occasional explosion.

"Taylor! You need to get out of there! That was Oni Lee, if he's here Lung can't be far behind!" Came Wheeljack's frantic voice. He was almost shouting at me through the Bluetooth.

Nodding, even if he couldn't see it, I forced down the panic and made for another exit. Wheeljack continued to feed me information that he was pulling from the internet. "Oni Lee's a teleporter, he leaves short-lived clones behind, and uses them as suicide bombers. His power is possibly limited by line of sight." Nodding again, I tried to keep to the shadows. "If this is right, Oni Lee and Lung are rarely apart."

Stopping in the shadows, I felt myself tremble. Lung, the leader of the ABB, was a pyro-kenetic brute that got stronger the longer he fought. When he first arrived in the city, he took on the protectorate and won. Even more terrifying, he had fought the _Endbringer_ Leviathan to a standstill.

Coming to a junction I turned outwards, heading for another exit.

Before I could reach it, I felt something move behind me. I threw myself forward and a knife passed where my neck had been. I rolled over but the clone was already dust. _Fuck!_

Looking around, I spotted Oni Lee. He was standing on a nearby ship, looking away from me. Whatever had his attention must have been important, I watched as he collapsed into dust.

Whatever was going on, it was happening further in, near the centre. So I planned to skirt the edges of the graveyard as much as possible. If I could just get around the next hull there would be– an explosion knocked me off my feet, throwing me backwards and knocking my mask loose. Another ice wall blocked the way.

Dazed, I laid there, looking up at the sky. My thoughts were sluggish, but I kept wondering why Lee hadn't finished me off. My body ached and my ears were ringing from the last explosion.

As the ringing faded, I realised I could hear shouting on the other side of the ice.

Pulling myself up, I straightened my mask and crawled towards the wall. The mask had cracked in places but the lenses were okay. The voices were muffled, either from the wall or because of the ringing in my ears, but Rewind was in my pocket. His hearing was as sharp as ever.

*They're setting explosives! Run!*

At Rewinds shout, I forced myself to my feet and ran. Ducking behind an old dumpster I covered my ears just as the explosions started.

Explosions echoed through the graveyard, making the ground beneath me tremble.

A wall of ice, nearly 10 feet tall now circled the graveyard. I was trapped and Oni Lee was still here. Somewhere in the darkness, something roared.

_That's it. I've had enough! _In the back of my mind, I felt something give.

/Everything you've experienced, everything you are... /

*Taylor, Listen to me! I know you are scared, but you need to stay calm and get out of sight. Whatever is going on, you are not the main target.* Rungs voice crackled through the bluetooth, something must have broken and was interfering with reception *Take a deep breath...An...rE...* Rungs voice crackled and faded as the bluetooth died.

/...Has led you to this moment./

Movement above me caught my attention. Oni Lee was standing on top of a nearby wreck, he stared at me before idly tossing a grenade in my direction. I threw myself forward to avoid it. It exploded behind me, reinforcing the ice wall. When I looked up, Lee was gone. He knew I wasn't a threat, he was just toying with me.

/Now... Reach out and take hold of the flame/

Anger surged at the dismissal, pushing down the fear. No! I refuse to die here tonight! A cold sense of calm flowed through me. The fear and anger were there, but it was buried deep in me, like I was floating above it all.

If escape wasn't an option, I'd have to see this through. I pulled my gun. I doubted it would do much good, but it was better than nothing.

I made my way deeper into the graveyard, following the sounds of fighting. I tried my best to stay out of sight. Sticking to the shadows, moving only when I was sure it was safe.

When I reach the clearing, it looked like a scene from hell.

There was fire and smoke was everywhere, reflecting on the rusty boats and casting everything in the same ghastly red and brown colours.

It was clear who was winning. Four teens were scattered around the clearing. In the middle of it all, a vengeful demon, stood Lung.

He was nearly eight feet tall, scales covered most of his body and his face was twisted into something inhuman. His metal mask was slowly dripping off his face in molten droplets.

The man in bike leathers pointed his arms and hands. What I thought was smoke from the fires moved to cover Lung. Lung sent a wide blast of fire towards the smoke user. He threw himself sideways, the fire clipped his shoulder and he rolled to put it out. The darkness lifted briefly before closing in around his head.

A stout, butch girl commanded a pair of monsters to circle Lung. Forcing him to turn to keep them in sight. A blond girl in a tight, purple costume aimed a gun at Lung and fired. The bullets flattened harmlessly against his scales.

Oni Lee appeared behind the blond, knife in hand. He slashed at her. Another boy, dressed like something from a ren-fair, gestured and Lee's body jerked, throwing off balance. The blond girl turned, but Lee turned to dust before she could shoot.

The butch looking girl whistled, one of the monsters tackled Lung from behind.

Claws and teeth tore into Lung. Rolling Lung tried to find purchase. His now clawed hand lashed out, catching the monster in the side making it yelp and thrash in pain. Pushing his claws deep into the wound Lung levered himself up and drove his other hand into the monster's throat.

It's yelping was cut off and a gout of flame tore through the creature. The dead body pinning Lung briefly. With a scream of rage the short girl ran towards him, a metal rod in hand.

"Bitch! NO!" The blond girl ran forwards, trying to stop her, but she stumbled and fell short.

'Bitch' reached Lung before he could stand, with a crack she brought the rod down on his head. He shrugged the blow off and surged to his feet.

Stepping out into the clearing, I brought my gun up. Lung's broad, exposed back made a perfect target. The noise of the discharge was lost as Lung roared, his body jerked before falling to his knees.

"RUN!" I screamed but Bitch refused to listen.

She brought her weapon down on Lung again and again. I fumbled to reload my gun while the blond girl peppered him with shots.

Lung caught Bitch's hand mid swing. He surged to his feet, crushing her hand with ease. His other hand closed around her throat as her body was covered in flames.

I shut my eyes. The blond girl screamed

/Never look away./

Dropping the body, Lung turned to face me. He was huge, nearly ten foot tall, his body was covered in scales. Large muscles bunched and twitched as his body continued to change, wings started to grow from his back.

With a roar, he charged me. Darkness closed around him but Lung just sent another wide blast of fire.

I tried to run when my leg jerked suddenly, knocking me off balance and sending me to the ground. The impact knocking my mask askew again. I rolled over in time to see Lung right above me.

Panicked, I brought my gun up and fired. There was a sickening squelch as the large, spike tipped round punctured Lungs eyeball before discharging. This time Lung roared in pain.

As he stumbled backwards, the darkness closed in around us both.

I couldn't hear or I couldn't see anything. My stomach rolled as I lost all sense of direction. Then the darkness lifted, leaving a clear path in front of me leading to a hole in the side of a nearby ship. I run towards it.

Lung fired blindly and a gout of flame just missed me, hitting the ship and making the hull glow cherry red from the heat.

Once safely inside, I moved away from the entrance and tried to catch my breath. I could hear more noise from outside. It sounded like the fight was moving away. I wanted to go back and help but_... Fuck!_

He just... He just killed that girl. _He burned her alive!_ I couldn't get the images out of my head, how could somebody do something like that. My stomach churned and I just managed to pull my mask up before throwing up.

Reaching up, I pulled the broken Bluetooth from my ear and threw it away. It wasn't worth repairing anyway. It was just too fragile. We tried to build too much into it. Thankfully, it wasn't my only option.

Sitting against the hull I pulled Rewind from my pocket, something I should have done earlier.

"Rewind, call Miss Militia."

She answered almost immediately "Taylor! Thank god. Are you okay?"

"I..." _I'm not fine. _"I'm okay, I'm near the centre of the graveyard. Lung's nearby."

"We know. Listen, do you have a way of letting us know where you are exactly? In two minutes one of Dragon's suits is going to come get you, but she needs to know where you are."

Rewind beeped and a glance at his screen showed my exact coordinates via military GPS. I quickly told them to Miss Militia.

"Right, Dragon says there is a clearing there. Stay out of sight, but the moment she lands climb on and hold on tight."

"He's killing people," I whisper, my voice shaking.

"Which is why you have to stay out of sight until Dragon lands." Her voice was quiet now, eerily calm, as if she was ticking items from her shopping list. Hearing her calmed me a bit, too. "Dragon is almost there, and Armsmaster is on his way and will be there soon afterwards. You have to stay focused, stay hidden, stay quiet and everything is going to be fine."

Nodding, I end the call. I could barely hear the fighting outside now. I needed to move, since I wouldn't be able to see Dragon land from here. It was only as a struggled to me I feet I realised just how tired I was.

Shaking my head to clear it, I pulled my filthy mask back on. What was left of it anyway, and adjusted my scarf.

I took a deep breath and headed back outside, hoping I wouldn't regret it. The sounds of fighting had moved further away. Getting as close as I can to the clearing without being seen wasn't going to be easy, but I had to try.

I tried not to look at the body of that girl and her monsters. They were smaller now, the bones and exposed flesh were sloughing off. It was easier to see they actually were dogs.

Something moved nearby and I brought my gun up. The blond girl was sitting in the shadows, gun in one hand and the other clutching at her side, I could see blood.

"Oh, it's you." She smiled weakly at me. "Thanks for trying. Sorry about hitting you, we didn't see you."

I wasn't really sure what to do. Weren't you supposed to put pressure on it to stop the blood flow? Without really thinking about it I pulled my scarf off and pressed it against the wound, trying to stop the bleeding. There was a lot of blood.

"Grue is trying to lead Lung away." She sounded tired. "Don't know where Regent is... bastard. Lee is dealing with the hero's, keeping them from reaching us. I'm Tattletale by the way." She focused on my face before smiling. "And you are waiting for rescue."

Before I could say anything, I was interrupted by the sound of engines. The Dragon suit circles overhead, before going into a dive. At the last moment it straightens, engines straining to reduce its speed, and lands. Its four legs bend to put its body close to the floor. The articulated head turns towards me.

"Get on!" the voice is synthetic but clearly female.

Looking between the suit and Tettletale, I make a decision. Throwing one of the girls arms over my shoulder, making her hiss in pain, I pull her to her feet. She's barely able to walk, but with some effort I manage to get her over to the suit.

Laying her across the suit's back I climb on behind her. The moment I'm on the engines rev-up to speed.

Just as Dragon leaves the ground, Oni Lee appeared. I raise my gun desperately.

Everything went white.


	11. 2-4

_Everything you've experienced, everything you are... _

I walked through a world made of metal. Smoke filled the air while fuel, oil and precious metals stained the ground around me.

A voice was whispering quietly in the back of my mind, repeating words I had never heard but somehow half remembered. It sounded like me, but older, wiser.

As I followed the voice, it led me through metal plains, fields of floating blue crystals that sang and vast cities with buildings that towered into the sky.

Gradually, the city around me changed. This place was old and stained with rust while bodies lay in the streets, warped and twisted by the fires that had claimed the city.

_Everything you've experienced, everything you are... _  
><em>...Has led you to this moment.<em>

The ground in front of me opened, and the voice called me on. I followed the path, going deep beneath the planet's surface. When I reached the very bottom, I saw a vault, light spilling out from its open doors.

That's when I saw him ahead of me, the mech I had dreamed about. He was broken, barely alive. Deaf, half-blind and numb to the world around him, but he pulled himself onwards.

I wanted to help, but every time I reached out, my hands passed through him, becoming wispy and intangible.

_Everything you've experienced, everything you are... _  
><em>...Has led you to this moment.<em>  
><em>Now...<em>

I followed him into the vault, the voice was clearer now, stronger. I looked at the broken mech as he lumbered forward and wondered if he could hear it too.

The vault was old, ancient. In the centre was a pedestal with a bright light floating above it. An object of some kind was at the centre of the light but I couldn't make out any details, just a vague shape.

_...Reach out and take hold of the flame._

Besides me, the mech grabbed the object at the centre of the light. Lightning arched off the walls as he bellowed in pain. Instinctively I brought my hands up to shield myself as the vault was bathed in light. In the middle of it all his body was being repaired, lost limbs replaced and broken armour restored.

When the light faded, he stood tall, proud, a sense of purpose flowing from him.

For one brief moment he looked at me before he walked out of the vault.

I turned to watch him leave. Behind me, the pedestal lit up.

_...Reach out and take hold of the flame._

The same words repeated again. I walked around the pedestal, trying to get a better view but no matter how much I moved or squinted, the glow was just too bright.

_...Reach out and take hold of the flame._

What did I have to lose? Steeling myself, I plunged my hand deep into the light. My fingers brushed against smooth metal and for one brief moment, I could see it. I felt an overwhelming need for unity.

Then pain.

With a gasp I jerked awake.

The ground under me was cold and hard. Had I fallen asleep in the basement again? Blinking, I tried to clear the fog from my head. The dream was already fading to nothing as I tried to look around for my glasses.

My whole body ached, my ears were ringing and I was having trouble focusing. It felt like when I was still taking painkillers. _What happe-_

It all came flooding back. The fight, Lung, Oni Lee!

Forcing myself up, I tried to look around. The world was a blurry mess of shapes. It took time to sink in.

_No, no, no. _

In a panic I felt my face, ignoring the aches and cuts. My mask was gone!

"oh 'ent 'ou!" The words were mangled, but I recognised the voice. Lung!

Slowly, I tried to move. I grasped at the ground around me in the hopes of finding my mask. A bright flash and a burst of heat soared over my head. I dropped to the ground with a yelp.

"She can't see!" Tattletale's voice? "Her glasses were built into her mask."

Heavy footfalls moved towards me. Lung growled something, and his hands closed around me, half lifting, half dragging me across the ground.

He dumped me on the ground, away from the other teens. When I tried to sit up, my hand landed on something cold and metal. Almost immediately it began to map itself out. It was the Dragon suit. Thankfully I didn't need my eyes to 'see' it.

I tried to look in the direction Lung went while letting my power slowly seep into the suit. If I was lucky, I would be able to repair it before he could notice.

I could hear him asking Tattletale questions. It sounded more like nonsense mixed with growling, but she apparently understood him. I was too focused on what I was doing to even try listening to her.

He asked a couple more questions, each sounding more human and even more angry than the draconic growls from before.

I couldn't do this, it was just too big, too broken to fix. My power would kill me before I could finish.

Whatever Tattletale said to Lung, it had been the wrong thing. The girl screamed, the smell of burning skin reached me and in my head, I remembered him burning 'Bitch' alive.

He was going to kill them.

_He kept trying to fight. He was shouting at them, wanting answers.  
>Broken. Deaf, half blind and numb to the world around him he pulled himself onwards.<br>Tattletale screaming as her friends still burning body fell to the ground._

It had to stop.

With one big push, I sent as much power as I could into the suit.

Pain exploded in my chest and power crackled across the suit, repairing and reshaping it.

Small flight stabilising fins on its sides moved, opening into large wings. Jet intakes re-aligned, and and the dragon-like face shifted. The ornamental mouth cracked open, hinges and joints appearing as its neck stretched out. High-end processors merged together, forming a brain module and pre-existing programming was appropriated, reprogrammed and re-purposed.

I shut my eyes from the overwhelming pain and I couldn't breathe. It felt like I was being electrocuted from the inside but I hung on tightly to the suit. I had to do this. The aches in my body were gone, replaced with a numbing cold that was working its way inwards. I forced myself to watch as the spark chamber formed, I just had to hold on a little longer.

A bright green spark bursting into life, was the last thing I saw before everything went black.

The dust that had gathered from the explosion began to settle when Lung returned, dragging Grue behind him.

_He's pissed, _Tattletale's power told her, her head still ringing from the aftermath of the explosion.

"No shit," she muttered to herself. Blood loss was making her light headed.

Unceremoniously dropping Grue to the ground, Lung said nothing, pacing around instead as he slowly began to shrink.

_Power reacts to threats. Doesn't see us as a threat. Can't talk properly at that size. Waiting for power to subside. Wants information. _Even her power was slow to respond.

She spared a quick glance to her would-be saviour. Probable concussion, Tinker, wanted to be a hero. She was out cold, not too far from the remains of Dragon's battle suit.

_Light weight construction. Not combat ready, prototype._ The moment Oni Lee had appeared, Dragon's suit had rolled sideways, shielding both girls from the blast and taking the brunt of the damage.

Why would they send a prototype to rescue a single tinker? _Friends in the PRT, possible recruit. _Great, just what she needed. If Lung didn't kill them, the PRT would.

She could hear explosions in the distance, probably Lee. _Keeping the PRT busy, no interruptions. _

The Tinker was just starting to stir when Lung slapped Tattletale across the face.

"oh 'ent 'ou!" _Who sent you?, _Her power supplied.

Before she could say anything, the Tinker started moving, drawing his attention. Lung sent a blast of fire at her.

Her movements had been sluggish, from a concussion, trying to feel her way. _Using hands. Poor eye sight. Needs glasses._ Tattletale glanced at Lung and her power supplied her with more information. _Sense of honour. Won't attack a weak or crippled opponent. _"She can't see! Her glasses were built into her mask." There was nothing she could do about the girl's identity, not at the moment.

Lung ignored her and dragged the Tinker girl over to Dragon's suit, turning back to Tattletale once he was finished.

Lung glared at her before growling something. Her power translated it to, [Who sent you?]

"Sent us? What do you mean?"

"On't 'aye a meh!" [Don't lie to me!]

"Ou hit ma 'a'ino ju' a ah umfire hit a 'afe 'ou'e?" [You hit my casino just as the Empire hits a safe house?]

"Just dumb luck, honestly."

Lung grabbed her by the hair, teeth bared wide and far too close to be comfortable. "Bretty brond gel, 'ou're wha' Gaiser 'ike." [Pretty blond girl, You're what Kaiser likes.]

"Fuck no!" She couldn't stop herself from grinning at him. "I'm Jewish!"

With a snarl, Lung picked her up and pinned her against a ship. Her power gave her only a moments warning before a burning hand pressed against the open wound on her side. The pain actually forced her to lose consciousness for a moment, as her mind blanked out before a scream tore itself out of her throat.

Grue's arms were bound, bringing both feet up he kicked out at Lung, catching the side of his knee. Lung dropped her to floor, letting her curl into a ball as she choked back a sob. _Cauterized the wound, stopped the blood flow. Doesn't want me dead...Doesn't want me dead yet._

"I'm the one in charge, not her!" Grue shouted at Lung.

Lung's foot hit Grue in the chest, breaking bone and making him double over.

"On't wa'tde 'ou're brea'!" [Don't waste you're breath!] he snarled at Grue, before turning back to her. "Ooh dells ou 'ere 'ta go? Wha' i 'ou dell em?" [Who tells you where to go? What did you tell him?]

A noise behind him drews Lung's attention. "Gon't 'ove!" [Don't move!] he snarled at the Tinker. "Ih hav'went forgotten about you!" [I haven't forgotten about you!] The bones in his jaw made a cracking sound as they reverted back to normal.

Lung's transformation had mostly reverted, letting him speak normally. "I broke your little toy." He gestured to the ground where the remains of the tinker's weapon lay. "My tinker could use an assistant."

Lifting her head and trying to ignore the pain, Tattletale turned her power on the tinker. _Is trying to fix Dragon's suit. No tools, doesn't need them? Has striker power. Takes time or concentration to work. Needs a distraction. _

Taking a deep breath she forced herself upright. "Hey!" She coughed a couple of times before continuing "You're right, we had info on all your places. Your 'boys' aren't as scared of you as you think they are. Maybe you should spend less time sitting on your ass?" Her grin was a little weak but it was enough to get Lungs attention.

"But really? All this? Just for a casino?" Her power latched onto the idea, making the pounding in her head worse. "No. You're worried... about a bunch of kids? No... The Empire is pushing and you don't have enough men, you can't sto-"

The back of Lung's hand lashed out and caught her face. She could taste blood where she had bitten her cheek. That wasn't enough to stop her.

"That's not it... you're worried about what we know... the safe house?" The grin was genuine now. Her skull felt like it was about to explode but she couldn't stop herself. Not when she was so close to uncovering the truth. "Was there something there we shouldn't have seen?"

Behind Lung, Dragon's suit started to move. To stop him from noticing, she let go of her power, letting it run wild.

"Of course, the paperwork. You own a house. A nice house in a good neighbourhood in the south side of the city, away from you and your gang... who is she? Your favourite bitch? No, no."

She laughed, long and hard. "Does she know? Does she even know you exists? Does she know daddy is a monster?"

Lung's eyes flashed, his entire body suddenly bursting into flame, teeth sharpening into fangs, mouth open in a silent roar of rage. Tattletale recoiled, from the heat and raised her arms in a futile attempt to block the wall of fire and anger-

***TSCHE-CHU-CHU-CHU-TSCHE* **

The sound was deep, mechanical and right behind him. Before Lung could turn, Dragon's suit roared.

As tall as a horse but much more broad, the mechanical dragon stood protectively on strong limbs over the Tinker who was curled into a ball. Large wings stretched wide and its head was held low, mandibles quivering as it let out a long, low growl.

A blast of fire from Lung glanced off its head and in response, the dragon charged.

As the dragon charged, it pulled its wings close against its body, pieces actually retracting and locking into place. Its long neck stretched as it lunged at Lung. Its mouth closed on nothing but air as Lung threw himself to the side.

Rolling to his feet, Lung sent a blast of fire that did little more than scorch the beasts hide.

The dragon turned to chase him across the clearing. Its head darted forward like a snake, jaws snapping as Lung continued to dodge. A wide sweep of its long, spike-tipped tail caught him in the chest, throwing him across the clearing and into the side of a boat.

Before Lung could pull himself up the dragon roared a challenge.

The fire erupted around Lung as he surged to his feet and charged the mechanical beast. _How dare this toy mock him,_ he thought.

Silver scales had almost covered his body, as a fire wreathed hand slammed into the beasts head, snapping it to one side.

With a burst of speed the dragon struck out. This time, its jaws closed around his arm, picking Lung up and tossing him away like a broken toy.

The impact with the ship made his vision swim even as his power tried to stop the bleeding his lost limb caused. Around him, the metal hull of the ship warped and twisted from the heat of his flames.

By the time Lung pulled himself free of the ship, his missing arm was starting to regrow. With a roar Lung sent a blast of fire at the beast, the hotter fire making its armour glow.

In retaliation, the dragon reared its head back before spitting a gout of blue-white flame at him.

Lung brought his remaining arm up and braced himself against the flame. His scales began to blister and char at the heat and he struggled to stay upright as the physical force of the hit pushed him backwards.

The moment the flames died, Grue enveloped Lung's head in a cloud of darkness. Swinging his arm wildly, he sent a wide arc of flame at the boy, who threw himself to the ground to avoid being burned to a crisp.

"What are you doing?!" Grue shouted at the dragon "Get him out of here!" He had no clue if it could understand him.

Yellow eyes narrowed at the boy before the dragon charged at Lung. Pinning him down, its claws dug deep into Lung's body before it spread it wings. In one massive heave it took off, carrying a still struggling Lung with it.

Lung continued to fight, lashing out with claws and fire as the dragon flew them out over the Bay, his back and shoulders cracking as his wings began to form. With a swipe of its tail the dragon severed Lung's still growing wings and dropped him into the water far below.

Despite the pain in his chest, Grue managed to lift Tattletale, who had passed out, carrying her over to the fallen tinker.

She didn't look good. One hand was clutched to her chest, her lips were turning blue and she was making weak gasping noises. As he slid to the ground next to her, he noticed a small robot climbing on top of the girl.

It patted her face, beeping frantically as it did. When she didn't respond, it moved towards her neck and placed a hand on her throat. It beeped at him a couple of times but he wasn't sure what it was trying to say.

With a crash, the dragon landed close by. The little robot climbed on top of the tinker and started waving at it, beeping as he did.

The robot pointed at the tinker and then Tattletale as the sound of an ambulance siren played from it. The dragon stepped forward, scooping the tinker up with its claws before turning towards him. Using its head to push him back it picked up Tattletale and took off.

Cursing, Grue pulled himself up and tried to make his way out of the graveyard, hoping he would be able to catch up before that thing ate them or something.

Panacea was just finishing her last patient of the night when her phone started to ring. She frowned at the unknown number and blocked the call.

She tried not to sigh as she realised she would have to change her number, again.

The only people who had her number were the PRT, the hospital and her family. Every so often, someone would break into the hospital records and her number would end up in the hands of some rich asshole that wanted to hire her.

Twice more her phone went off. Finally, she turned the damn thing off. She was tired and her sister was on her way. She was going home.

Her phone started to ring. This time, her screen showed a red insignia styled a bit like a robotic face. She wasn't great with technology, but turning a phone on remotely and messing with the display shouldn't be that easy.

Despite her self, she answered "Hello?"

"Oh, Hello!" The voice sounded like a man but there was an odd metallic ring to it, almost like a voice changer. "I'm really sorry to call you like this. My name is Wheeljack."

She frowned. That sounded like a cape name but not one she had heard off before. "How did you get this number?"

"It's not important." He sounded frantic. "In less than a minute, a dragon is going to land outside. It's carrying some people and they need your help!"

What.

She was about to hang up and chalk it up to a stupid prank call when people started to scream outside.

Rushing to the window, her jaw dropped at the sight. A mechanical dragon was standing right outside the doors, with a pair of bodies laying on the ground in front of it. Occasionally it would nudge the dark haired one and let out a whining sound.

_Fuck my life_.

Running to the doors, she could see people trying to get out of sight. A number of people were pointing their phones at the creature. The hospital security guard clearly had no idea what to do.

The healer in her that she was growing to resent spurned her on.

"Will it hurt anyone?" she asked her phone.

"No, I don't think so." She sighed, right.

If it wasn't for the size, the teeth, the spikes, the big teeth, and the glowing yellow eyes, she could say that the 'dragon' looked pitiful, nudging one of the girls and whining.

_You know what? Fuck it. _She had been to Endbringer battles and dealt with capes for most of her life. This barely made her top ten 'weirdest things I've ever done"

Pulling up her hood, to hide her face from the cameras, she walked forward. The hospital was her territory, no one messed with it. The dragon turned to look at her, glowing yellow eyes stared intently before a small robot sitting on its head squeaked at it. The little robot jumped down and ran over to the dark haired girl. The dragon stepped back, lowering its head to the floor.

Shaking her head, Panacea took the girl's hand in hers. The problem was immediately apparent: arrhythmia. Synchronising the heart's rhythm barely took a thought. That done she turned to the other girl. Blood loss, burns, cracked ribs, the list went on. Someone really had it in for the girl.

She stabilised the girl, she would deal with everything else later. "Somebody get a gurney." She called over her shoulder. Behind her, a couple of orderlies edged there way out of the doors, trying to keep the healer between them and the dragon. She ignored them as she rattled off what the blond girl needed.

As they loaded the dark haired girl onto a gurney, the dragon sat up. Panacea spread her arms to cut it off. "You heard me, she's going to be fine." She took a breath and hoped this didn't go wrong. "But right now, you're blocking the entrance. Go wait in the carpark or something." She made shooing motions and to her surprise, the dragon slunk away in the direction she indicated.

"And you!" she snapped to her phone. "Just what on earth is going on?"

* * *

><p>Edit: tons-o-typos that needed to be fixed.<p> 


	12. Interlude 2a - PHO

Welcome to the Parahumans Online Message Boards  
>You are currently logged in, <strong>Wheeljack<strong>  
>You are viewing:<br>• Threads you have replied to  
>• AND Threads that have new replies<br>• OR private message conversations with new replies  
>• Thread OP is displayed<br>• Ten posts per page  
>• Last ten messages in private message history<br>• Threads and private messages are ordered by user custom preference.

Topic: Mecha-Lung!  
>In: Boards ► Boards ► Places ► America ► Brockton Bay Discussion<p>

**Dogsbody** (Original Poster)  
>Posted on December 1, 2010:<p>

Holy shit!

I'm at the hospital getting my leg looked at when this landed in the car park!

**(Showing Page 1 of 5)**

**Karaz**  
>Replied on January 1, 2000:<br>What the hell is that?

Also, first!

**Wonderer**  
>Replied on January 1, 2000:<br>bullshit! Its fake.

**Owlman** (The Guy In The Know)  
>Replied on January 1, 2000:<br>no its real, I'm at the hospital as well.

I've got video of it landing

**SkyLancer** (Cape Groupie)  
>Replied on January 1, 2000:<br>Is that one of Dragons?

**Redbutterfly**  
>Guys, check <span>this<span> thread, think its related to the battle in the graveyard?

**Zach5353** (Cape Groupie)  
>Damn. Panacea rules, even mecha-Lung doesn't mess with her.<br>Redbutterfly maybe, did anyone see where it came from?

**Masked_One**  
>I work near the hospital at Maple Cafe. Saw the whole thing happen. Gotta say, if I didn't get that cheese bagel and coffee...<p>

**L33T** (verified cape)  
>SkyLancer, Can't be. I would need to see it up close to tell but it doesn't match her style.<br>Dragon builds to a theme, most of the dragon features are ornamental. Working animatronic features don't fit her style. Plus the-*Edit: Sorry, power got ahead of me*

**Redbutterfly**  
>L33T, your geek is showing<p>

**Xcrimson_crossX**  
>OMG ITS DRAGON! Whats she doing in brockton bay?<p>

**End of Page. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5**

**(Showing Page 2 of 5)**

**PrudishP** (Veteran Member)  
>whoa, this thread is moving fast<br>I live near the hospital, that dragon is sleeping in the carpark  
><span>here<span>, here, and here.  
>I tried to get closer but the the PRT have closed the carpark off.<p>

**wainwright202**  
>L33T, if its not one of dragons, who's is it? Can any one tell who it was carrying?<br>PrudishP (Veteran Member), the prt have shut the carpark? What's going to happen to the cars?

**Owlman**  
>wainwright202, it dropped a couple of girls off, you can see in the vid it was really worried about one of them. The sound doesn't carry very well but it was actually whining!<p>

**wainwright202**  
>Your right. I wonder Panacea said to it?<br>PrudishP, A midnight snack?

**Galley**  
>Y'know, if it wasn't so pissmyself terrifying, that dragon bot sure looks adorable! I mean, just look at it whine and shuffle about when Panacea takes that girl from it.<p>

**RWD** (Archivist)  
>poor quality video, I'm guessing you filmed this on a phone. The lighting makes it hard to tell but it might be the blonde girls. she is wearing a mask after all.<p>

**Rabbm**  
>No. Blonde girl is member of Undersiders, she's a thinker. Boss wants her dead. Never seen the other before.<br>**- User has received an infraction for this post**

**Wheeljack** (inventor)  
>it's mine.<p>

It's a remote drone with limited independent intelligence. It was scavenging in the graveyard when lung started trashing the place. Normally I would just let the villains fight it out but that girl was jogging nearby and was caught in the crossfire.

**Grapejoint**  
>Oh shite! We got a new tinker in town? The gangs gonna be all over him like a fat kid on cake!<p>

**End of Page. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5**

**(Showing Page 3 of 5)**

**XxVoid_CowboyxX**  
>Replied on January 1, 2000:<br>Holy shit!  
>I know her! her name is Taylor, she goes to school with me<br>Here, you can see her in this video!

**Whispering Observer**  
>Replied on January 1, 2000:<br>Whoa you cant post that here!

**Nyrus**  
>You sure that's Taylor? definition is too fuzzy, can't make her out. Looks like a guy to me.<p>

**Galley**  
>Wheeljack, yea right, your more of a tinhat than Void.<br>*Edit* actually, look closely, there's another bot in the video, its sitting by the dark girl.

**Rng**  
>XxVoid_CowboyxX, How can you be sure? You have shown a great deal of worrying behaviour in the past.<br>Are you sure you are not simply projecting what you want to see?

**SrgDuck** (Verified PRT Agent)  
>Wheeljack, You made that thing Wheeljack? You better head to the PRT quick, or the gangers will be all over you.<p>

**RoboLincoln**  
>Replied on January 1, 2000:<br>XxVoid_CowboyxX is right. Search for "girl in locker" its the same girl.

**Galley**  
>It's clearly tinker tech (cause its made of bullshit), but do you think its got an AI or is it being remote controlled?<br>Can you get a tech master?

**EspressoBot**  
>Wheeljack, Cool, do you take commissions? What are your rates?<p>

**Palshife**  
>Heh "Locker Girl has upgraded to Tinker Master!"<p>

**SpecificProtagonist**  
>… actualy... someone told me once that triggers happened 'on the worst day of your life'.<br>you don't think... oh god.

**TrueHuntress** (unverified Cape)  
>Taylor trigger? Like that wimp could ever be a cape.<p>

**SgtWill** (Verified PRT Agent)  
>I can confirm there was an altercation between Lung and another cape group in the ship graveyard.<p>

That's all we know at the moment, please avoid baseless speculation, it can put people's lives at risk.

**Tin_Mother** (Moderator)  
>Please keep idle speculations to a minimum.<br>XxVoid_CowboyxX, RoboLincoln, Palshife,12 enjoy your 20 day suspension.

**End of Page. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5**

**(Showing Page 4 of 5)**

**Stalking_Tanuki**  
>what did they say? The mods wiped it all before I could see it.<p>

**Diamondegg**  
>Replied on January 1, 2000:<br>Guys, go here.  
>the mods don't care what people talk about.<p>

**Slamdance**  
>Diamondegg, go where? The website is down.<p>

**Squawkbox**  
>Hey, guys, I just so happened to have my camera (I was heading out to take pictures of the Boardwalk for a project) and managed to get a few good pictures of the dragon bot. <span>Here<span>, here, and here.

EDIT: Hey, they got removed? Uhoh, I think I hear the PRT Black Ops running up the stairs...

**End of Page. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5**


End file.
